


take care, take care, take care

by hoosierbitch



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: BDSM, D/s, Developing Relationship, Kink Negotiation, M/M, Non-Sexual Use of Bananas, Self-Esteem Issues, Service Kink, Service Top, intense D/s scenes, kate argent happened
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-18
Updated: 2014-03-01
Packaged: 2018-01-12 23:21:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1204312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoosierbitch/pseuds/hoosierbitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's nothing easy about relationships. There's sex and there's fighting and there's fighting about sex, and there's misunderstandings and anger and hurt. But there's also someone else who will make you food, and bully you into going furniture shopping, and sometimes there's someone for you at the end of a long day who's willing to listen,  or just sit next to you in silence.</p>
<p>So: Derek and Stiles. Frottage. Paperwork. Ikea. Communication. Porn. Kate Argent-related feels. And probably more paperwork later on, because Stiles is thorough, and he has a kink checklist that Derek will fill out, <i>so help him god.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. take care, take care, take care

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to ivorysilk for the lightning fast beta!
> 
> **Content Advisory** : Stiles is 17 when he enters into a relationship with Derek. The D/s element to the relationship is really light at first, when it gets more intense I'll warn for it clearly in each chapter. Derek has issues stemming from a previous (unhealthy) relationship with Kate Argent. The kink in the fic is negotiated and consented to, but it's imperfect; Derek and Stiles are imperfect people, they're new to each other, and they're going to make mistakes. (And then they're going to do their best to fix them.) 
> 
> If you need more information about potential triggers, or think I've missed any warnings, please let me know.
> 
> _eta:_
> 
> (this is so hard to say.) i'm not going to write more in this series. for mental health reasons, i need to let go of some unfinished projects. i gotta take care of me.
> 
> this series has been one of my absolute favorites to write. it constantly surprised me while writing it, and i was overwhelmed by how many people identified with the relationships and dynamics in the story. if anyone ever writes more in this 'verse, i would love it if you would share it with me so that i could share it with others. thank you for the comments and the support. 
> 
> i adore you all & wish you love and happiness.
> 
> _take care, take care, take care_

Stiles has been looking pale lately.

Derek may not be the alpha of their patchwork pack anymore, but he's pretty sure he's at least a member in good standing by now. Stiles is _definitely_ in the pack; he made himself a 'Vice President' badge and everything. So Derek thinks it might be okay if tries to treat Stiles the way he’d been taught to treat pack growing up.

Derek was never meant to be an alpha, but alphas are also never supposed to have to work alone. Packs support each other, and Derek has always loved being helpful. After the fire, when it was just their pack of traumatized two, Laura had teased him about it. She called him Mother Hen, but she liked it when he did their laundry, or had dinner ready at the end of a long day, or the times he'd buy ice cream after bad break-ups and watch action films with her until she fell asleep.

Lately, the Beacon Hills pack meetings have become an excuse to check in on each other and hang out. Derek never quite knows what to do with himself once the: “Is there new evil? No? Cool,” part of the night concludes, but he always attends. He tries to remember how to act normal, tries to get better at small talk and laughing and making casual physical contact.

One night, when Stiles looks extra pale and is a little too quiet, Derek figures, what the hell; maybe the kid could use a little Mother Henning.

Derek waits until most of the team's on their way from the Stilinskis' kitchen to the living room to start up _Batman Begins_ before grabbing something from the fruit bowl and throwing it at Stiles.

"You look like a skeleton. Eat a damn banana."

Stiles manages to accidentally juggle it about four times before dropping it on the floor. He picks it up and eats it though, peeling it from the bottom and using the stem as a handle while rambling to Derek about lifehacks and monkey intelligence.

*

Stiles starts to use Derek's loft as Research Central (which is capitalized, which Derek knows, because he's included in all-pack text message threads now that are so long he had to switch to an unlimited texting plan).

"Why are you here?" Derek finally asks him, the third time he finds an empty Red Bull can in his trash, and has to fish it out to move it to the recycling bin. "Don't you have a home? Aren't there libraries in this town that come with books of their very own? Or cafes that provide caffeine that’s slightly less…” He looks at the can of Red Bull. “Toxic?”

"All of those places tend to frown on me mumbling out loud while I read about mermen and demonic trees and succubi. Plus, it's quiet here. Very zen."

"We haven't encountered any succubi; why are you reading about them?"

Stiles freezes for a moment. "For...research purposes. For. Researchy...reasons."

"I'm sure you just read the engravings for the articles."

Stiles glares before heaving a sigh and closing up his book. "It's fine, I'll go. Cool Beans cafe has half-off mochas after seven, so I’ll head down that way."

"No--you don't have to leave, I was just..."

"Oh. Marking your metaphorical territory? Allowing me access, but making sure I know there are _No Trespassing_ signs?"

Derek had just been wondering why Stiles hung out at his place, given that Stiles doesn't like him very much. "Stay."

Stiles sits back down and opens his book back up. "Fine, bossypants."

*

Derek takes care of Stiles as much as he can.

Stiles doesn't seem to notice.

He eats what Derek puts in front of him, or next to him, or throws at his face. He wanders out of the apartment when Derek tells him to leave, trailing the smell of fatigue and half-thought out rambles about demons and location spells and gluten-free muffins.

Derek wonders for a while if Stiles listens to him because he's worried that Derek's going to start slamming him into walls again, or if it's some weird leftover response-to-an-alpha thing, but Stiles doesn’t seem afraid. He argues with Derek, complains, whines, and makes a general nuisance of himself, but eventually he always ends up doing what Derek asks him to do.

*

When he kisses Stiles, he has no excuse. He's not trying to be helpful. Stiles's research is not going to be assisted by the addition of Derek's tongue. It's not because Stiles looks tired or worried or thin and Derek thinks that kissing him will help. He just looks...like Stiles.

They're both sitting on Derek's bed, which they do a lot, because it's basically the only comfortable piece of furniture in the loft, and they can go for hours once they start reading. Stiles dog-ears his pages whenever something triggers a ramble and he feels the need to lecture Derek. His rants about his English class or the footnotes in the Bestiary can go on forever. Derek's always been taught to value books, so the little folds at the corners of the pages irritate him more than the interruptions.

Derek puts his hand over Stiles's when he's about to dog-ear the copy of _Grapes of Wrath_ that had belonged to Cora. Stiles's fingers are long, and graceful, and go still immediately under Derek's touch. Stiles doesn't move. He just stares at Derek. At Derek's mouth, actually, so--so--

God, he has no excuse, and he should know better, he _does_ know better, but he takes the book from Stiles's hands, leans over, and presses their mouths together, because he wants to.

Stiles doesn't move, for long enough that Derek starts to worry that he's _really_ fucked things up, but then Stiles shifts his head a little, leaning to the left, and Derek rewards him by bringing a hand up to the side of Stiles's face. Stiles's cheek is soft under his palm, and his lips open hesitantly when Derek traces the edge of his jaw.

When Derek pulls back, Stiles is breathless. "This is--this is--" Derek moves his hand along the side of Stiles's head. His hair is soft. "I've fallen asleep and you're a Steinbeckian-inspired daydream. Wet dream."

"A wet dream inspired by the dust bowl?"

"You've actually read _Grapes of Wrath_? I thought this was Cora's copy. Yup. I'm dreaming."

Derek pinches the skin on Stiles's neck, right below his ear, and Stiles's pupils expand right along with his sharp inhale. "There. Now you know you're not dreaming."

Stiles's mouth works for a while, half-formed words and questions and sometimes just silence coming out. Derek watches until it stops being funny, and then he kisses Stiles again. He nips at Stiles's lower lip, and Stiles full-on _moans_ , which gets Derek hard faster than anything ever has before.

"I want to make out with you," he says, aware that his voice is basically a growl, but unable to smooth it out. "Just for a little while. Keeping all clothes on." Stiles is a teenager, and a virgin (and hadn't that been a fun, death-related conversation when the evil druid rituals had come around?). Derek doesn't want to pressure him into doing anything he doesn't want to do. "No repercussions, no strings attached, and you can stop anytime you want to. How does that sound?"

Cora's copy of Steinbeck, which Derek had been so worried about, goes flying over the edge of the bed. In exchange, Derek gets a lapfull of Stiles. "Shit, fuck, _yes_ ," Stiles says, his hands grabbing at Derek's Henley. "Dude, yes, consent given, _make out with me please_."

Stiles is inexperienced and over-eager, pressing his mouth against Derek's like he's bringing cymbals together. Derek puts up with it for a bit, because it's still nice, and the teases of tongue he gets make him want to growl, but eventually he takes control to slow things down.

He lays a hand on Stiles's lower back and one between his shoulders and flips them over, pinning Stiles beneath him. Stiles spreads his legs to make room for Derek like it's the natural thing for him to do. Derek ruts forward on instinct, and when he growls with satisfaction, Stiles just...relaxes. He says, "Do whatever you want," and looks up at Derek. Derek--who's not used to people looking at him without fear, anger, or suspicion in their eyes--doesn't know what to do.

Stiles feels fragile beneath him, between his arms, the lines of their torsos shifting with every breath.

"Don't make promises you're not ready to keep," Derek says, looking at the stretch of skin on Stiles's neck that he'd pinched earlier, pink and tender.

"I'm--I'm pretty sure that whatever you want to do--"

Stiles has no idea what he wants ( _seventeen, seventeen and virgin hungry_ ), so Derek kisses him to stop him from making a mistake; from making promises he'd feel obligated to keep.

Stiles's hair has grown long enough that Derek can fist a hand in it and pull Stiles's head back. Stiles gasps when Derek pulls it, grinding his hips up against Derek's, and arches his neck even further back, which, _god_ , yes.

Derek bites Stiles's lips, licks at his teeth, laughs when Stiles squirms against his grip (and then groans when he smells the spike in arousal, because apparently Stiles likes it when Derek pulls his hair and laughs at him).

He kisses and licks a line down Stiles's neck, careful not to leave marks. (He doesn't want this to follow Stiles back home, or into his school, or out of Derek's bed; not if Stiles doesn't want it to.) It's hard to stop himself when he gets to the neck of Stiles's t-shirt, which had gotten pulled down when Derek manhandled him onto his back. The thin fabric’s stretched over a swath of pale skin that begs, with every shaky breath that Stiles takes, for Derek to mark it.

"Can I," Stiles says, gulping, "can I--" He rocks his hips up hesitantly, the line of his cock hard through his jeans, and Derek says, "Do it," before he can think it through.

Stiles makes a strangled sound and his hands dig into Derek's shoulder blades. His fingers are tense and it hurts a little, hurts good, and he holds on tighter when Derek makes his way back up to Stiles's mouth, pulls his hair again, and fucks Stiles's mouth with his tongue.

Stiles makes sharp, hurt noises with every trembling thrust of his hips, and Derek's eyes flash bright when he moves his hands down Stiles's sides, over his ribs, his hipbones, until he has his hands wrapped tight around the firm cheeks of Stiles's ass.

He sets the pace after that, and Stiles's eyes glaze over. He doesn't fight or complain, he doesn't even help--he just mewls when Derek pushes his own hips down, pulling Stiles's body up, grinding them together like he wants to make it hurt.

"Are you going to come for me?" Derek asks, when Stiles's lips are bitten red and swollen and there's sweat darkening the edges of his hair.

Stiles looks up at him, his eyes focusing again, and asks, "Can I?" He sounds surprised, like he hadn't thought it would be allowed.

"I want you to make a mess of yourself," Derek says, moving one hand back Stiles’s hair so he can yank his head to the right and growl into his ear. "I want you to come in your pants for me. I want you to say my name when you come, and I want you to do it _right now_." He bites Stiles's ear, because a mark there probably won't be noticed, and he wants his breath, his voice, to be the only thing filling Stiles's mind when he comes.

Stiles writhes under him, making Derek fight to hold on for the first time, Stiles's legs digging into the mattress before wrapping around Derek's hips. Stiles starts to come like that, a strangled cry escaping his mouth as his hips work in little circles, pressing so hard against Derek that he can feel the line of Stiles's zipper, feel his cock jerking with every pulse.

"Derek," Stiles moans, the syllables stretched so long that he barely recognizes his own name.

He can smell Stiles's come. He jerks his own hips down hard (he's not close to coming, but he wants to know what it would feel like to get himself off against Stiles's body; he wants to know what Stiles would do) and Stiles's fingers stop digging into his back and instead move to pull Derek's mouth back to his.

"Derek," Stiles sobs, kissing him again, "please, please please please--"

He squeezes Stiles's ass so tight that he knows it will bruise, he bites Stiles's lip with teeth that are threatening to become fangs, and he doesn't say _Mine_ even when Stiles's whole body tightens in a long, curved arch, trapped under the weight of Derek's torso.

When Stiles starts to come down, Derek strokes his hair and kisses his neck. Stiles's body goes boneless under his, and Derek hums with contentment. He's still hard, but he feels satisfied. Victorious, maybe; or proud. Happy, he realizes eventually, when Stiles brushes a small kiss against Derek's forehead.

He holds himself up and shifts his weight so that he won't crush Stiles in the afterglow. It's hard to let go of Stiles, but he has to; he tells the wolf inside of him that Stiles is not Derek's, and will want to leave.

"I--that was--" Stiles laughs a little, but he's starting to tense up again. "Um."

"Good," Derek finishes for him.

"Yeah, I mean, duh, yes, obviously, good. Unexpected, and, wow, my essay on Steinbeck is going to be more focused on homoerotic subtext than I had originally intended--"

"You have homework," Derek says with a sigh, dropping his head to rest on Stiles's shoulder. It's nice to feel Stiles's skin, to feel a body pressed against his, even through their clothes.

"Yeah," Stiles says eventually. "Uh--can my walk of shame include a detour to your bathroom? Because things down south are getting a little..."

"You're allowed to use the bathroom," Derek says, not moving his head, because he doesn't want to look at Stiles's face as Stiles gets ready to leave him. "But I'm hoping there's not a lot of shame in your walk. You were..."

Stiles laughs again. "Virgins are allowed to be awkward though, right? I mean, no pun intended, but it comes with the territory, so you can't hold my performance against me." He gasps and turns on his side, towards Derek; pressing their bodies against each other almost accidentally. "Oh _shit_ , dude, you didn't even come, did you? I am such an asshole, _fuck_ \--"

"I don't want to."

"You don't--" He can hear Stiles's nervous swallow. "Was I...that bad? Because you can talk me through, like, a blowjob or something. You don't, uh--you're probably past the 'coming in your pants' phase of your life, huh?"

"You were amazing," Derek says, pushing them apart. "And later I plan on masturbating to the memory of you coming in your pants, saying my name."

" _Oh_ ," Stiles says. "I...can I watch? Or should I go? I really don't know the etiquette here, dude. Help me out."

Derek looks him over. His shirt collar's still pulled low, and the unmarked skin there is going to be too much for him to resist much longer. He reaches out and tugs it back into place.

"You go to the bathroom and clean up. Grab a pair of my boxers or sweats if you want to change. Then come back out. If you want to finish reading your book here, I'd like that. Otherwise, you can go home. If you want to do this again, on a different day--after you've had time to think about it--I would enjoy that." Stiles is staring at him like he's become a stranger, and it's making Derek's skin prickle uncomfortably. "What?"

"You're really nice," Stiles says, in the tone of voice most people would use to say, "You've got spinach stuck in your teeth."

"You tell anyone else, and I tear your leg off and kick you in the head with it."

A smile tugs Stiles's mouth back into its familiar curve. "Cool."

*

It's possible that what they do when Stiles comes back into Derek’s room, dressed in Derek’s clothes, could be classified as cuddling. Derek only really needs the one hand to hold his own book up, and Stiles fits pretty comfortably under his other arm when he's slouching against Derek's pillows, and that way Stiles's hand is in easy smacking distance if he tries to mark-up Cora's book again.

Derek’s not sure what to call it, isn’t sure what it means, when he brings Stiles a glass of water and a banana, and Stiles peels his banana upside down and offers a piece of it to Derek.

Eventually _The Grapes of Wrath_ comes to an end, and Stiles’s phone starts buzzing regularly.

Stiles asks for permission before he kisses Derek goodbye. Says, "Can I...?" with his eyes flicking between Derek's mouth and his lips. Derek presses him against the door, kisses him, and only lets Stiles go when he's half-hard again.

"Anytime," Derek says. He holds Stiles against the wall for a moment longer, since it's been a while since he's smiled, and it takes him a few seconds to work up to it. The effort's worth it though, because when he smiles at Stiles, he gets a smile back that's bigger than any that he's seen before.

_Mine_.


	2. unfamiliar things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles hangs around after they finish up, giving Scott a flimsy excuse about looking up some Hale family talismans with Derek. It's an obvious lie, but Scott just glances between the two of them, exchanges a separate glance with Stiles, and leads the rest of the pack out. 
> 
> Scott's trust is an unfamiliar thing.

Their meeting is at Derek’s, because the Sheriff got sick of the amount of furniture that gets broken when Scott, Isaac, and and the Terrible Twins all attempt to occupy the same space, and Derek’s apartment is basically empty. Nothing in it to break. There’s also no TV, so their  _Batman_  marathon gets postponed until the following Saturday, when Melissa’s begrudgingly allowed them to take over her house for the night.  
  
Stiles hangs around after they finish up, giving Scott a flimsy excuse about looking up some Hale family talismans with Derek. It's an obvious lie, but Scott just glances between the two of them, exchanges a separate glance with Stiles, and leads the rest of the pack out.   
  
Scott's trust is an unfamiliar thing.   
  
Scott trusts Stiles even when he know Stiles is lying, and seems to think that if Stiles trusts Derek, he'll be safe. Derek, who's getting tired of tiptoeing around Scott, but is constantly worried about overstepping his bounds, always feels off-balance if they spend too much time together.   
  
"Is, uh--is your offer still good?" Stiles asks, when the apartment empties, and the echoes of the sliding door slamming shut have died away.   
  
Derek's loft still smells like pack. The mingled scent of all of them is a comforting elixir even with its uneven notes. Allison's distrust and control alongside Isaac's nervous, new found happiness; the twins' intertwined youth, fear, and anger; the overlying scent of Lydia, who has always smelled like flowers and saltwater. Scott smells like  _Alpha_. He used to smell like gym class, his mom, and cut grass.   
  
Derek walks towards Stiles and presses him backwards until they are a series of parallel lines; Derek, Stiles, and the door.   
  
"Yes," he says. He wants to bury his nose in Stiles's neck and breathe him in: the Jeep, the Sheriff's cologne, paper, loneliness, and something that Derek has only ever been able to identify as a sense of humor. Something that tickles his tongue, but not his nose; something like feels like a smile might smell.   
  
"Good," Stiles says, licking his lips. "But I have, uh--stipulations. Before we start."   
  
"Okay." Derek forces himself to take a step back. "That's fair."  
  
"You're being very agreeable," Stiles says suspiciously. Derek shrugs. He's only an asshole when time is short and hard decisions have to be made. Or when other people are acting stupid. It's not his fault he hangs out with a bunch of hormonal teenagers. Or, well, maybe it is. Fuck it. Stiles narrows his eyes and asks, "Have you been replaced with a happy-go-lucky podperson Derek?"  
  
"No."   
  
"That's what pod-Derek would say," Stiles points out unhelpfully. "What if I called you a good boy and told you to roll over and play dead?" Stiles seems ready to smile when Derek growls at him. "Okay, so. I just want to talk for a bit. About the, uh--the sexing."   
  
"I think you can just call it sex."   
  
"Or I could call it frottage, or awkward, or mortifying."   
  
"I'm going to stick with 'good sex.'" He takes another step back, trying to take in all of Stiles's body language; he doesn't understand what Stiles is doing. "What are we talking about?"   
  
"I want--I need to know why."  
  
"Why what?"   
  
"Why  _me_ ," Stiles says, exasperated. "Because it can't just be for convenience, since you could go to literally any bar anywhere and get laid by, like, a dozen people, who would probably be better at it than me. And I doubt it's overwhelming desire for my hot bod, because I know you have a mirror, and the different leagues we're in are from different sports. My sport is curling. And if you went after anyone else in the pack--literally anyone, except possibly Allison--there would be fewer complications, so..." His body is tensing; hunching over. "Are you doing this to mess with Scott?"   
  
"No."   
  
"...would you care to elaborate on that?"   
  
Derek sighs. Humans are so difficult. Stiles can't smell the  _want_  wafting off of Derek. Or the frustration following in its wake. Besides, Stiles is even more complicated than most other people; his mind jumps in ways that Derek can't always follow, and his scent and posture and words so often mismatch. He's a puzzle that Derek doesn't think he'll ever fully put together.  
  
"I like you," Derek says, looking Stiles in the eye and pretending that it's easy for him to admit something that private.   
  
"Would you care to elaborate on  _that_?" Stiles replies, his voice turning into a squeak at the end.   
  
Derek has a list of reasons. It starts with Stiles's intelligence, includes his loyalty, and ends with his bravery. But ever since Derek lost Laura and disappointed Cora, he's been trying to be better at protecting himself. "No."  
  
"You like me?"   
  
Derek doesn't bother to repeat himself.   
  
"You like me. And you want to sex me up. You want to sex me  _good_."   
  
Derek growls, grabs Stiles's wrists, and pins them to the door above Stiles's head. "Any other stipulations?"   
  
Stiles had closed his eyes when Derek grabbed him, and they flutter open when he tries to answer. "Yes. There were--there were definitely other stipulations," he says, breathless. Derek bites at Stiles's shoulder lightly, though the layers of flannel and cotton. "I want to tell Scott."   
  
"Okay."   
  
"Really? Wow. Uh--also, if we’re going to get to the stage of sex that’s slightly less clothed and slightly more...dick-engaging...then we have to use condoms.”   
  
“Werewolves can’t get or give STDs.”   
  
“Seriously?”   
  
Derek heaves a sigh. “Yes, seriously. I’m not going to joke about something important. We can use condoms. But we don’t need to.”  
  
“I won’t end up on, like, a Teen Mom ‘Werewolf Edition’ Special?” Stiles sounds half-serious. Derek is trying  _really hard_  to be patient.   
  
“No. What other stipulations?”  
  
“Oh. I, uh--that was kind of it. I only had the three. I was expecting more of a fight. I have counter-arguments prepared, if you want to hear them."   
  
Derek growls, inhaling the scent of  _Stiles_ , wiping everything else out of his mind. "I can’t get you pregnant. I don’t mind condoms. I want you, and I don't care who knows. If you want to tell someone, you tell them. If you don't, then don't." Derek's been a dirty secret before; he hadn't enjoyed it.  
  
"I'm going to tell Scott that you made me come in my pants," Stiles warns. "And that you're Mr. Grabby Hands when I try to have conversations. And I'm going to tell him that you're nice to me--"   
  
Derek lets go of Stiles's wrists and lifts Stiles off the ground, his hands on Stiles's hips. Stiles wraps his legs around Derek's waist, the way he had last time, like he wants Derek to stay in the cradle of his body. Derek carries him across the room and lays Stiles down on the bed carefully, even though he really wants to throw Stiles down on the floor and tear the three layers of his shirts off with his bare hands.   
  
"Jesus god," Stiles says. "You're so strong. You're stronger than pornstars. Not that I watch porn. Or not that I don't watch porn, I'm a normal teenage boy, this is a no-judgment zone."   
  
"Are you planning to take your clothes off in this no-judgment zone anytime soon?"   
  
"Maybe?" Stiles says, sounding nervous again. "I did use that whole 'different leagues' metaphor earlier, right?"   
  
"I want to take your shirts off," Derek says slowly. He’s trying his best here, but he doesn't know how to make Stiles stop smelling nervous. "I want to make you come again. Want to watch your face while you do it. Maybe put you on your belly and have you rub yourself off against the mattress, bite you when you come--" Stiles whimpers and Derek stops talking. "Is that not something you want to do?"   
  
"No, I just--I don't want to come in my pants before you even touch me," Stiles says, his face flushed.   
  
"You could come just from me talking about what I want to do to you?" Derek asks curiously. Stiles nods. "Let me take your shirts off, and I'll give it a shot." Stiles squirms under Derek again. "You made this a no-judgment zone," Derek whispers. "I'm adding a stipulation of my own, which is that you have to do what I tell you."   
  
"That's a pretty big damn stipulation, dude. That's more like a new piece of legislation. A change in the structure of the government kind of big." Derek slides his hands under Stiles's t-shirt, and, just as he hoped, Stiles stops talking.   
  
"I'm not going to ask you for anything big," Derek says. "I just--I need you to trust me when I tell you that I want you to do something. It's the same as last time," he continues, getting up on his knees and straddling Stiles's hips. "No strings attached. You say no to anything you don't like. You can leave whenever you want." Stiles nods. "But if you stay, will you do what I tell you to do?” Derek waits, listening to Stiles’s heartbeat and comparing it to the frantic tempo of his own.   
  
Stiles’s voice, unsure and curious, brings him back. "Do you promise you're going to keep being Nice Derek?"  
  
Derek's not entirely sure what that means, but Stiles is pack. Derek's first choice, if he wanted to protect Stiles, should be to leave Stiles alone. Since he hasn't mastered that level of self-control, he'll do the second best thing. "I promise to take care of you."   
  
He watches the pale line of Stiles's throat move when he swallows. "Then take my clothes off already," Stiles says, the bravery that Derek admires so much shaking in his voice.   
  
Derek peels the layers off one at a time. Hoodie, flannel, t-shirt. The t-shirt, he removes slowly. He bends down and licks each new inch of skin that's revealed, reveling in the fact that he's the first one to touch Stiles like this.   
  
Stiles is blushing when Derek finally peels the shirt over his head (and decidedly does  _not_  tangle it over Stiles's wrists, because if he's going to start tying Stiles up, then they're going to have to draw up about a hundred more pieces of legislation).   
  
"Good thing the lighting's dim," Stiles says, with an uneasy laugh. "Otherwise I'd blind you." Derek raises an eyebrow at him. "Because of how pale I am."   
  
"I can fix that," Derek says.   
  
"I know you're hot like the sun," Stiles says, "but I don't think you can make me tan--" Derek licks the space between Stiles's collarbones and grins when Stiles's voice squeaks to a stop.   
  
"You look good," Derek says, trying to remember what it used to feel like when he took his shirt off and had to worry about someone being displeased. "I want to mark your skin," Derek explains.  _Use your words_ , his mother had always said.  _You have no idea what you're doing,_  Kate had said, when he'd been nervous and new with her. He'd probably smelled the way Stiles smells now.  
  
"Do you have any idea how bad I want to touch you?" Derek asks. He doesn't give Stiles time to make it into a joke. "I want to lick the dips between your ribs. Bite your nipples. Fuck your belly-button with my tongue the same way I'm going to suck and fuck your hole. I want to leave marks on you--hickeys, maybe. Bite marks, if you'll let me. I just want to..." He looks Stiles over. "I want to play with you."   
  
Stiles makes a strangled sound. "You might be playing a very short game," he gasps, "because I'm pretty sure that if you touch my nipples--or  _say_ nipples again, or if you--if you touch my dick--I'm going to come." His blush is an angry red.   
  
"You can come more than once, can't you?" Derek says with a shrug. "You're a teenager. I can make you come in your pants, get you hard again, then make you come for me a second time. Or did you have other plans for the evening?"   
  
"No," Stiles says, lifting his hips off the bed to press his groin against Derek's ass. Derek, whose thighs had just begun to notice the effort of holding himself up for so long, rewards Stiles by grinding himself downwards. “No other plans,” Stiles moans. “Nothing but you, you and my--playing, with me, please." Stiles leans back tilts his head, exposing his neck, just like he had last time, when Derek had been pulling his hair, forcing his head back, only this time Stiles is doing it all on his own.   
  
Derek puts a hand in Stiles's hair (even though he wants to wrap it around Stiles's neck, just rest it there, just to feel him breathe) because he knows that this is okay. He pulls until Stiles whimpers. Then he kisses Stiles for the first time that night, and smiles, because it already feels familiar. Then he says, "Stop me if this is too much," and moves down the bed.   
  
Stiles's cock is a hard, prominent line pressed against the front of his jeans.   
  
Derek's fucked around with a lot of guys, but he's never been on this side of a first time, and he wants it to be good. He kisses Stiles's cock through his jeans before he starts licking at it, pressing his face up against the hard line of the shaft through the fabric, losing himself in the overwhelming smell. Precome's made a small dark stain in the denim, and Derek sucks at it until front of Stiles's jeans are soaked.   
  
"Talk," Derek growls, his hands on Stiles's hips, even though Stiles has been tremblingly holding himself still on his own so far. "Tell me what you're feeling." Mostly, he wants to make sure Stiles doesn't feel uncomfortable, or used, or just not-that-turned on, but what he gets is a moan that rises and falls with the rough strokes of Derek's tongue.   
  
"Feel--I feel you, your mouth," Stiles says, his voice a tight, rambling comfort. "Can't stop thinking about what it would feel like on my cock--if you'd suck it, or lick it, or press your face against it--"   
  
"I'd take you down to the root," Derek says, because he'd picked up a few tricks in New York, and that had been one of them. "And swallow when you came for me."   
  
"Jesus fuck," Stiles swears, fighting against Derek's grip. "I love how strong you are. Got--I've got bruises on my ass from last time, and it hurts when I sit. I get hard just  _thinking_  about your hands on me."   
  
Derek takes one hand off Stiles's hip and presses it against Stiles's cock, feeling the hot length throb against his palm and fingers. Stiles's whole body freezes. "Talk," Derek says gently.   
  
"I want to come," Stiles whispers. "Please. I'll come again for you later, I promise, but I want to come with you--with you between my legs--your mouth on me, holding me down,  _making_  me stay still."   
  
"Say my name when you come," Derek says. He feels calm, like he only ever has in a few of the times he'd dommed in New York. He feels calm even though his heartbeat is threatening to break through his chest and his cock is painfully pressed against his zipper. He feels in control for the first time in months; he feels like he's not in danger of making a mistake. "I'm making that a rule."   
  
"Yes," Stiles says. "Can I move my hips?"   
  
"No, but you can try," Derek says with a grin, putting both hands on Stiles's waist and suckling the head of his cock through his jeans until Stiles kicks the mattress in frustration, his hands scrambling in the blankets for something to hold onto.   
  
"Coming," Stiles stutters, "Derek, please, you--your mouth--"  
  
Derek sucks harder, presses Stiles down deeper into the mattress, and pulls off just long enough to say, "You look so beautiful right now."   
  
Stiles's cock jerks and his mouth shuts with an audible clack. His stomach muscles go tense, come starting to pulse out of him. His abs tighten until his torso comes off the bed, curling forward, his hands grabbing onto Derek's shoulders. His feet are pressed against Derek's thighs now, digging in.   
  
"Good," Derek says. "Keep coming for me, exactly like this, just like I want you to." Stiles is making wounded noises, and his body spasms with every piece of praise that Derek doles out to him.   
  
There's power in making Stiles feel good.   
  
(He shoves away thoughts of Kate calling him  _Good boy_ , because he has to believe that this is different; he can't stop himself from having this with Stiles.)   
  
Eventually Stiles loosens his grip on Derek's shoulders, and his legs relax to sprawl onto the mattress on either side of Derek. Derek stretches and moves until he's in a push-up position over Stiles. "You good?" he asks.   
  
"I think I might be dead," Stiles says frankly. "I think you might have killed me with your mouth. I've never come that hard in my  _life_. And I've come a lot. I've got toys and gigabytes of porn and--"   
  
Derek rests his weight on his right arm and grazes one of Stiles's nipples with his left hand. "I can make you come harder than that," he says quietly, because he doesn't want Stiles to leave yet. "Do you need to take a break before I do?"   
  
Stiles looks up at the ceiling. "This is the best sex dream ever."   
  
"Fair warning: I'm going to pinch you again to prove you're not dreaming." He pinches Stiles's nipple this time. Stiles squeaks in protest.   
  
"That hurt!"   
  
"I warned you," Derek says, rolling his eyes. Then he moves a bit lower on the bed. "Want me to kiss it and make it better?"   
  
" _Fuck_. Yes. Please."   
  
"How long will it take you to get hard again?" Derek asks, before licking a circle around Stiles's nipple with the tip of his tongue.   
  
"Like, fifteen minutes?" Stiles says. "Although that's usually with me watching porn, and you're actually  _hotter than pornstars_ , so maybe less than that?"   
  
"Do you like nipple play?"   
  
Stiles groans. "Definitely less than fifteen minutes if you keep asking me shit like that."   
  
"Do you?"   
  
"Not really? I mean, it never did anything for me when I was fucking around with myself."   
  
Derek hums, then sucks Stiles's nipple into his mouth. He keeps his hands on Stiles's rib cage, tracking his breathing patterns, listening to the beat of his heart, trying to translate the garbled words that break before Stiles gets them out.   
  
Stiles is, in fact, into nipple play. He likes having them suckled, likes having them flicked with Derek's tongue, but doesn't like Derek's teeth making contact at all. He whimpers when Derek pinches both his nipples at the same time and tugs them gently away from his chest, looking down at Derek like he's gotten lost and is looking for direction.   
  
"I want to give you a blowjob," Derek says, tugging hard once more before smoothing his hands over the planes of Stiles's chest. "Is that okay with you?"   
  
"Yes, please," Stiles says, nodding so fast he's probably giving himself whiplash.   
  
Derek peels Stiles's boxers and jeans off slowly. Derek's not a talker, never has been, but he says, "Nice," when he's got Stiles spread out in front of him. Stiles shivers with the praise. Derek will think of more compliments for next time, if there is ( _please_ ) a next time, because he wants Stiles to always be comfortable in his body.  
  
He cleans the cooling semen from Stiles's dick and stomach with his tongue. Revels in the salty taste of it, because there's nothing else that will ever taste more  _Stiles_  than this. He wants the scent of Stiles in his bones, the taste of him lingering on his tongue, Stiles's skin forever against his skin.  
  
By the time he's licked up every bit of come from Stiles's body, Stiles's dick is hard again, and dripping pre-cum onto his stomach. "And I just finished cleaning that up," Derek says, with mock disapproval.   
  
"You know me," Stiles says, his breath shallow but steady; he's trying to keep himself under control. "Never been good at following the rules."   
  
Derek raises an eyebrow. "You follow my orders pretty well." Stiles eyes go wide, and Derek says, "I'm going to suck your cock now. You can put your hands in my hair. Pull it, pull me closer, push me back, whatever you want. I'm not going to hold your hips down this time." Stiles is panting harshly out of his open mouth, and his muscles are already shifting against Derek's hands. "I want you to fuck my mouth until you come," Derek says.   
  
"And say your name when I do," Stiles replies.   
  
For the first time, Derek wants to jerk himself off while he has Stiles here. He wants to jerk off while Stiles is watching him, listening to him, while Stiles does what Derek tells him to do because it makes both of them feel good. But he doesn't think he can do that, doesn't think he can concentrate on both of them at once, and Stiles's first times (first orgasm with another person, first blowjob; first fuck, maybe, eventually, hopefully) are going to be as good as Derek can make them.   
  
He hasn't sucked cock in years. He lets himself moan when he slides his lips over Stiles's pretty dick. Sucks at the precum until the taste of it overwhelms the taste of skin. He puts one hand on the base of Stiles's cock, because he can't take much into his mouth just yet, and it feels almost as nice in his hand as it does under his tongue.  
  
He fucks his mouth up and down on Stiles's cock for a while. Plays with the head, licks at the veins, twists his mouth in a way that's made more experienced men than Stiles lose control. He looks up at Stiles's face, eyes trailing over his chest (marked with Derek's fingers and mouth) and sees Stiles biting his lip.   
  
Derek pulls off for long enough to say, "I told you to fuck my mouth," then wraps his hands around Stiles's buttocks, puts the head of Stiles's dick in his mouth, and doesn't move.   
  
Slowly, Stiles starts to move on his own. Derek hums his approval and Stiles starts talking again. “‘Fuck my mouth,’ he says,” Stiles says, in a terrible imitation of Derek. "Like it's supposed to be easy, and not--not--" His hips settle into a choppy rhythm, his muscles too tense for grace, and his voice dies in a groan.  
  
Derek closes his eyes and enjoys himself. Enjoys the tastes and smells and sounds of Stiles. Knows that later, when Stiles is gone, the shadow of Stiles's pleasure will be embedded in Derek's bed.   
  
"It feels like--like I'm jerking off with your mouth," Stiles says, the words tumbling out of him. "Like you're...like it's all you, everything is you. Not a toy, not my hand--I'm not making this up. I'm not dreaming anymore," he slurs, "this is real. You pinched me and kissed it better. This is real and happening, I'm--I'm having sex with Derek Hale--"   
  
He finally puts his hands in Derek's hair, and pulls him down on his cock until Derek gags. "Sorry, sorry sorry sorry," Stiles says, pulling Derek off. Derek glares at him. "Or...sorry, not sorry?" Derek snarls before going back down, taking Stiles far enough back in his mouth that his eyes begin to water again.   
  
Obediently, Stiles goes back to the long strokes that make Derek gag (leaving an ache that always fades too soon). Maybe it's a werewolf thing, maybe it's a slut thing, maybe it’s just a Derek thing ( _cockhound_ , a hook-up had called him once), but when he swallows around Stiles's cock like he wants to drink it down, pretty soon it slides into his throat.   
  
It hurts, taking all of Stiles at once. It hurts just the same with every thrust, but Stiles is pulling his hair and babbling things that aren't actually words anymore and Derek feels so proud--no,  _happy_ , he feels so happy--that he's capable of making Stiles feel this good.   
  
Dimly, he's aware of Stiles saying his name, over and over again. He can feel Stiles cradling his head in his long fingers, not pushing, not pulling, just resting there. Derek forces himself to focus when he feels Stiles's hips hitch and then freeze. Derek stays true to his word, so when Stiles comes ("Derek, I'm gonna--watch out, I can't, this is as long as I'm gonna last, I even tried thinking of coach naked, but I can't  _stop_  it"), Derek swallows every drop.   
  
At first he chokes a little, fighting his gag reflex, fighting against the instincts that tell him to pull away. But then he swallows, his body welcoming it instead of fighting. He wants to take everything that Stiles gives him.   
  
Every bit of the discomfort is worth it when he sees the expression on Stiles's face when Derek pulls off and licks his lips.   
  
"I think I may have been the Dalai Lama in a past life," Stiles says eventually. "Because there is no way I've done anything good enough in this life to deserve getting a blowjob from someone as hot as you." Derek knows it's a compliment. A really nice one. It's just the first time Stiles has flat-out called him hot, and Derek had managed to avoid thinking about that up until now.  
  
"You can't be resurrected as someone who's still alive, Stiles."   
  
"Okay. Joan of Arc, then."   
  
"Better," Derek admits. Stiles is still mostly naked (shirts fanned out around him, jeans and boxers tangled around his ankles, Derek's hands resting on Stiles's thighs without him having made a conscious decision to put them there).   
  
"You're...really not at all naked," Stiles says. "Which is probably a crime. I'll ask my dad; I'm sure there's an exception to the indecency laws in there for you."   
  
"You're so weird," Derek says, sounding fond. His words feeling foreign again, like they had in the weeks after Laura, when he’d been lost and packless. He rolls himself off Stiles, goes to his drawer, and throws a pair of sweatpants at him. "There's semen all over your clothes. Do you need to wash them before you go? Or will your dad not notice?"   
  
"My dad tends to notice little things like me wearing other men's clothing," Stiles says, with a stilted laugh. "This, uh--this feels more walk-of-shame-y than last time." Derek's still standing by the bed. His arms feel awkward by his sides. He feels like he doesn't fit in his body. "You're really hard," Stiles says, staring at Derek's dick.   
  
"It'll go away."   
  
"I could, uh--aren't I supposed to help with that?" Stiles asks. Derek shakes his head. Stiles looks like he has more to say, but instead he just squirms the rest of the way out of his dirty jeans and tugs Derek's sweatpants on. "Dad's on the late shift. He won't notice." One of Stiles's hands goes to scratch his chest absentmindedly, and he hisses when his thumb brushes against his nipple. "Aw, man. I'm going to have to wear my softest t-shirts to keep from getting hard every time I move."   
  
"Sorry," Derek says.   
  
"Sorry, not sorry," Stiles murmurs. He sits back down on Derek's bed. "Look, did I--are you okay?" Stiles asks. Derek doesn't feel okay, but he doesn't have energy to admit to weakness right now. "You said you were going to be Nice Derek," Stiles says, with a little laugh. "Not Grumpy Derek Version Three."  
  
"There are three grumpy versions of me?"   
  
"Five. This is the third one."   
  
"Oh."   
  
"This is the one where you look like you're about to overflow with manpain. Just FYI."   
  
Oh.  
  
"Is there something I should apologize for? Because I kind of--I think I did everything that you told me to do. Which is also what you told me to do, so..."   
  
"Why do you want me?" Derek asks, because Stiles had gotten to ask him that. It had been stipulation number one, damnit; Derek should get an answer, too. And if Derek had anyone of his own to talk to about this, about Stiles, maybe he would have asked for that, too. Scott's his alpha. Stiles telling Scott is probably the closest Derek would get.   
  
Part of Derek doesn't want Stiles to answer Derek's question. He doesn't want to take his clothes off and smell how much more Stiles is attracted to his body than he is to Derek, and his goddamn face, which apparently has a documented series of unpleasant expressions. Then Stiles answers, saying, "Have you  _seen_  you?" and it’s actually easier for Derek to accept since he’d been expecting it.   
  
"Yeah," Derek says. He looks down at his hands, which Stiles likes, because they're strong. Derek works out. Keeps himself fit. Keeps himself in fighting form. Tries to be hot instead of pretty, because he'd been skinny and pale when Kate had licked his stomach and called him  _sweet_. "You have, too. It’s not a big deal."   
  
"The bad guys do seem to really hate your shirts."   
  
"Maybe I should shop at a different department store," Derek says. Maybe he should. His henley feels like it's scratching against every inch of his skin, and his jeans are too tight. Maybe he should take his clothes off, and let Stiles touch his body; let that be part of his first time. Let Stiles brag later about the hot guy he banged when he was seventeen.   
  
"You don't have to get naked," Stiles says slowly. "And if you're anti-orgasm, that's--I mean, I haven't actually heard of anyone being anti-orgasm before, but I'm cool with whatever you are. I just want to make you feel good. Return the favor, you know?"   
  
Derek turns away to grab Stiles a t-shirt from his dresser, a soft one, one that won't distract Stiles when he moves. He's supposed to be Nice Derek, he reminds himself, feeling stupid and angry instead.   
  
"Do you have homework to do?" he asks, trying to think of a reason for Stiles to stay that doesn't involve Derek's body or any favors Stiles thinks he owes him. "Or any actual research?"   
  
"No. That was, uh--that was my flimsy excuse to get alone time with you."   
  
"You should still eat something," Derek says, tossing Stiles the shirt and going to the kitchen area (he can still see the bed; see Stiles there, looking small all by himself on the mattress, pale skin against the dark sheets). "I can make dinner."   
  
"You make it sound like cooking dinner would be physically painful for you." Derek rests his hands on the counter and drops his head, lets it hang loose between his shoulders. "Are you okay?"   
  
Stiles stays still while he waits for Derek to answer. Derek wonders if Stiles knows how much he fills the space even when he's silent; how much less alone he makes Derek feel.   
  
Derek grabs some granola bars and bottles of water and goes back to bed. "I don't want to talk about it," he says. Even admitting that much feels like he's scraping his throat raw with sandpaper.  
  
Stiles says, "Okay," and leans towards him slowly, giving Derek every chance to pull away, before kissing him. "You made me feel really good tonight," Stiles says. "And if there's ever a way that I can make you feel anywhere near that good, I want you to let me know how." Stiles grabs the food and starts fighting with the wrappers, eventually handing Derek one of the two granola bars, which is already dropping crumbs onto his bed. "I kind of like you, in case you hadn't noticed."   
  
Derek, who can smell Stiles's arousal (and has been smelling it for years), has, indeed, noticed. He still lets himself eat the food that Stiles gives him, and curls around Stiles on the bed while Stiles strokes his hair. Derek wishes he could manage a full shift, as weak as he feels, and give himself an excuse to be silent and get Stiles to keep petting him.   
  
"I want to kiss you goodbye again," Stiles says, when the food's gone and they're both blinking away sleep. "And on Saturday, when my dad's working late shift, I want to come back here and kiss you hello. How's that sound?"   
  
"Good," Derek says. "Really, really good."   
  
*  
  
He dreams about Kate that night. Dreams about Kate and the years after her, when he'd fucked his way through crowds of people who were willing to punish him even though they hadn't known why he deserved to be hurt. Years where he'd doled out pain because he'd needed to feel powerful, when he could make someone cry and bleed and smell their arousal; know that they wanted it, the same way he had when he was fifteen and a slut for Kate's touch.   
  
Stiles is seventeen and Derek doesn't want to call Stiles  _Beautiful_  and leave him scarred by it.   
  
Saturday.   
  
Saturday, he will take his clothes off and do his best not to blame Stiles for liking his body more than he likes the man inside of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I also have a tumblr now! Uh, I HTML bad. It's just hoosierbitch. But on tumblr.


	3. nerds are sexy (and so are orgasms)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "So...is it me?" The last item on his handwritten _Why Derek Won't Whip His Dick Out_ list is 'lack of trust and intimacy with your partner.' "You don't want to come with me?"

Stiles comes to Derek's prepared. He's an overachiever, and being the research guy is pretty much his unofficial job in the Scooby Gang, so he doesn't know why Derek looks so surprised when he opens the door and finds Stiles with his arms overflowing with paper. (In Derek's defense, it is quite a large pile. Stiles'd had to replace the printer ink halfway through.) Stiles comes further inside and dumps the pile on Derek's one table. Derek slides his door shuts and warily comes closer. 

"You need more tables," Stiles decides. "And carpets. Maybe area rugs? Lydia should take to you to Ikea." He organizes his piles of papers. He's going to do this. (And then, hopefully, they're going to do _it_ , with _it_ being a mutually satisfying sexual experience.)

Derek eyes the papers like they might bite. "What the hell is all of that? Is there a new evil in town? And why does it involve Lydia's taste in my furniture?"

"There's no new big bad. And the Lydia advice is just the icing on the cake that is..." Stiles gives himself a drumroll. "Our conversation about orgasms!" He finishes up with jazz hands. Derek does not look impressed by them. 

"Our conversation about _what_? You could be _having_ orgasms right now, instead of--" 

"Instead of having a conversation? Have you met me? I talk. Talking is what I do. Well, that and plan-making. And problem-solving. Which is why we're here!" He pats the couch next to him. Derek sits down perched on the arm of the couch as far away from Stiles as possible. 

"Fine, be like that." Stiles pulls out his list and goes to idea number one. "Are you on Prazosin?" he asks, skimming the highlighted portions of information that WebMD had helpfully provided. "Or Amitriptyline, Desipramine, or any MAO inhibitors?"

"I'm a werewolf. Medicine doesn't work on us. Why does it matter?" 

"I wonder if there are ways around that," Stiles says, mind wandering to mortars and grindstones and Deaton and lacing crushed pills with wolfsbane. "We should work on that. You could use some help relaxing. Maybe if we lace Xanax with mistletoe?" Derek's eyebrows lower until he looks homicidal instead of angry. 

(Stiles wants to warn him that if he keeps making that face, it'll get stuck that way, but Derek would probably be totally okay with that.) 

"I was just asking because those medications can make erections and orgams difficult. I guess the werewolf metabolism probably takes the erectile dysfunction cures off the table--heh, literally," he says, tossing those pages from the small table onto the floor. "So. Moving on. How often do you masturbate per day?" 

Derek growls. 

"Okay...growl once for 'once a day,' twice for two, three for--" 

"It's none of your business. And, not that it matters, but I hate this conversation." Derek launches himself off the couch and paces over to a support beam, leaning against it like he's trying to distract Stiles with his body, and his muscles, and the way his shirt rides up a little bit to reveal an inch of pale stomach that Stiles--

The stomach that Stiles has never seen during sexytimes. Hence, the inquisition. 

Stiles picks up the rest of the papers and shuffles them unnecessarily in his hands. "I kind of think it's supposed to be my business, though. If we're...whatever we are.... If we're going to keep doing sex, then I kind of think your orgasms _are_ my business." He looks back down at his papers, clears his throat, and keeps going. "One of the forums said that if you jerk off too much by yourself, or do it too roughly, then it can be hard to...come to completion...with a partner." 

"I masturbate once a week," Derek says, "and I don't do it roughly. How many more questions are there going to be?" 

"... _once a week_?"

Derek pushes himself off the support beam and goes into the kitchen. 

"Do you mean, like, 'once a week' when we're distracted chasing bad guys, or ‘once a week’ that time you had Isaac and Cora living in your house?"

"I mean Wednesdays." 

Stiles blinks. Part of his brain is processing the fact that Derek feels uncomfortable and is trying to hide it by opening and closing drawers in the kitchen without taking anything out or putting anything away, but the rest of Stiles is doing fist-pumps, because lack of orgasms explains _so much_ about Derek's personality. 

"That's the craziest thing I've ever heard. We've dealt with jealous lizards, cosmetically-challenged emissaries, werewolf twins who combine like Transformers, and this is--this is--" 

"I don't usually enjoy them," Derek says, slamming a cabinet closed. It makes a sad whine before its joints pop and it falls off its hinges. 

Stiles stares at his notes. 

Apparently, he should have researched more.

Carefully, Derek puts the fallen cabinet down on the counter. 

"That doesn't mean I _can't_ have orgasms more than once a week," Derek says, his words stilted as he moves his hands over shattered wood. "For a while in New York, I fucked around pretty much every night. My dick works fine." 

"So...is it me?" The last item on his handwritten _Why Derek Won't Whip His Dick Out_ list is 'lack of trust and intimacy with your partner.' "You don't want to come with me?" 

Derek sighs, looking at the cracked wooden cabinet on top of his otherwise empty counter. "I might have to take Lydia on that Ikea trip." Stiles is very good at diverting conversations; he'll let Derek get away with it for a bit. 

"You should send Scott, Isaac, and Allison. You may not end up with any furniture, but if you put a recording of what would happen between those three up on youtube, you'd be an overnight sensation." 

Derek grunts his 'Yeah' grunt. Stiles has separate lists of Derek's grunts, angry faces, hunched shoulders, and growls. 'Preparing to talk about something personal' is a new expression. A unique expression. No list needed. "Orgasms with--when I come, it just--" He glares at Stiles and wood cracks between his fingers. "I don't like the way it makes me feel. And during sex, I want to concentrate on you, because everything we're doing is your first time doing it, and I want you to feel good." 

Stiles looks at his papers. Then back at Derek. He feels like he's being lied to. Or at least partially mislead. He wonders if that's how his dad felt, the last couple of years. His train of thought derails when Derek takes his shirt off and smiles. It's his fake ‘distract the deputy’ smile (smile #1 on the list; there's only two smiles on the list so far). 

"If you're--if you're trying to end this conversation early, then that's--I call foul. Dirty pool. Underhanded maneuver. Prey--" Derek flexes his stomach and Stiles drops his papers. "You cheat," he says, picking them back up. 

"I'm not cheating. I'm ending the conversation. You want me to come for you? Then get over here and make me." 

Something about that sentence makes Stiles's stomach roil. He keeps his eyes averted, because he legitimately has problems focusing when Derek's not fully clothed, and keeps going. "I want you to have orgasms with me because you _want_ to have orgasms with me," he says, because if the answer to their dilemma really is the bullet point at the end of the list he'd drawn up the night before--'lack of connection between partners'--then the problem is trust. Derek trusts Stiles in life-and-death situations, but not, apparently, during sex. 

Stiles forges on. "I don't want to _make_ you come. That sounds mean. I want to...give you orgasms. Which is the only gift that's appropriate for regifting, and you've got three regifts coming your way already--" 

Derek walks over to Stiles, his bare feet whisper-quiet on the metal floor. Derek stops in front of him, his right foot on top of Stiles's 'discard' print-out pile. Even his feet are sexy. Stiles clenches his eyes shut. 

"Why are you still talking?" Derek asks. "I know you want me. I can smell it." 

"Cheating again," Stiles says, wishing he had a way to smell Derek's mood, too. "I just want to finish this conversation before I--before you--before you take me to bed and make me forget all of things I want to talk about. As well as the awkwardness of this conversation, from which I might never recover." 

Derek, the sneaky, cheating bastard, gets on his knees in front of Stiles and slides his hands up the inside of Stiles's thighs, until he's teasing Stiles's cock through his jeans. 

Stiles tries to talk; the first attempt just comes out as a squeak. "Look--if you don't give me a really good explanation, then I'm only going to orgasm if you come first," Stiles says, his voice coming out in a rush, because this idea is his last line of his defense. "Otherwise I'm going to feel guilty the whole time we do it. And I don't want to have guilt sex. It sounds like much less fun than regular sex. Or happy sex. Or--" 

Derek puts a hand on the button of Stiles's jeans, and Stiles says, "Hey, Derek--stop." 

Derek freezes like he's been hit by a stun gun and nearly falls backwards before Stiles grabs his hands, moving them onto his knees. Derek holds on too hard. 

"Sorry," Derek says, sounding shocked and breathless. "I shouldn't have--shouldn't have touched you, like that, without--I know that's not what you wanted yet. I should have asked, I should--I should--"

"Just talk to me," Stiles says, putting his hands over Derek’s, trying to figure out what the fuck is happening in Derek's head. Derek is staring at the floor. 

"I’m--I’m sorry for touching you. Like that.”

“It’s fine,” Stiles says. “I said stop, and you stopped. Just--tell me why you were doing it?” 

"I was distracting you," Derek says. He starts to stand and Stiles yanks him back down. Derek lets him, then settles between Stiles's knees, holding on. Stiles laces their fingers together. "If I don't take my clothes off," Derek says, his voice flat and careful, "then I know that--that you're happy because of what I'm doing. Not just because I'm..." He looks down at himself, like having the hottest body Stiles has seen outside of a magazine is something to be unhappy about. "I like you," Derek says, taking both his hands back, "because I like _you_. You like me, because I'm..." His face, which Stiles has been getting so good at reading, is completely blank. "Because--have you seen me?" Derek says. He pastes on a grin and Stiles feels like he's going to be sick, because he's pretty sure that Derek is quoting Stiles.

"I've seen you," Stiles says. Derek tries to stand up again. Stiles grabs his wrists and Derek lets Stiles hold him down; hold him still, on his knees with his eyes averted. "I've seen you without your shirt _a lot_. Mostly after fights where you were protecting people, or protecting _me_ , or recovering from wounds that I--that I don't want to think about right now." 

He's not sure whether or not it's a good idea, but his spidey senses aren't tingling at him to stop what he's doing, so he puts a hand on Derek's shoulder. The muscles are tense. Derek's collar bone is prominent under Stiles's thumb. 

Stiles tries to sound soothing and understanding (it's the Scott imitation that he's been doing since he turned eleven, because Scott talks to most people like they're kicked puppies, and it works really well). "You like me because I'm me," he says, not bothering to check for confirmation, because Derek did nice things for Stiles for weeks before Stiles had even noticed. "I like you because you're you. Your body's just..." He looks around for a word that isn't 'lickable.' "It's really nice wrapping paper." Or armor, maybe; an invisibility cloak. Protecting Derek. Keeping people from looking too close at anything that isn't superficial. Keeping people from seeing 'Nice Derek,' who Stiles thinks might actually just be Genuine Derek. 

"Wrapping paper?" 

"Like, manly wrapping paper. With Chippendale dancers on it. Or, wait, no, I meant to say flowers, or puppies--uh, not puppies, I'm not trying to make a dog joke. I mean, like, snowmen. Or daisies."

"I look like daisies?"

"You look incredibly hot," Stiles says, because he knows Derek can hear truths as well as lies. "But I wouldn't have picked you to be my first--my first everything--if I didn't like what's under the wrapping paper." He looks down at his papers, spread out on the table, fallen under Derek on the floor. "I like you. And I trust you. But I can't make myself not be attracted to you." He takes a deep breath and starts to draw up a new plan. "Maybe we could have blindfolded sex, so I wouldn't be able to see you? Is that a good idea? I'd probably end up, like, kicking you in the kidneys a couple of times, but you heal fast." 

"No," Derek says. His hands squeeze around Stiles's knees for a moment, and then he's standing and pulling Stiles up with him. Stiles lets him, because Derek's not trying to escape him this time. "You like me," Derek says, with a confused smile, like he's won something he didn't know he was competing for. 

"If you pass me a note with a Y and an N, I'll circle the Y," Stiles informs him solemnly. "With a glittery pen. And I'll draw a unicorn on the note, too. Or a pegasus. I'm really good at horses." 

"I was promised a 'Hello' kiss," Derek says quietly, not quite meeting his eyes, "and I haven't gotten it yet."

"I did say something about that last time, didn't I?" 

"And now that there isn't a massive pile of paper between us--"

"I think you mean 'massive pile of issues and miscommunication' _mmmph_." 

Derek's kisses are becoming Stiles's favorite things. Derek puts both his hands on Stiles's face and Stiles feels like he's going to evaporate if Derek lets go; like Derek's lips teasing his are the entirety of what's anchoring him in this room. Stiles puts his hands on Derek's hips, then jerks them away when he encounters bare skin. 

"Sorry," he says, his words squeezing out between their pressed-together lips. He pulls back (again, Derek lets Stiles move even though he could so easily hold Stiles still). "I promise I'm not trying to sexually objectify you." 

"I like that you like my body," Derek says, pulling back and looking at him, still close enough that it makes him go a bit cross-eyed. "I just like that you--it's nice that you like more than just my body." 

"I have a soft spot for sparkling conversationalists," Stiles says, putting his hands back on Derek's hips, only higher, so he's just touching bare skin, and _oh god_ Derek's moving and Stiles can feel the muscles at work. "This is why we have conversations," Stiles says, his voice a couple octaves higher than is probably humanly possible, which is okay, because that means he's probably in supersonic ranges that only dogs can hear, so Derek can still hear him. "So that I know it's okay for me to--to do this--" 

He moves his hands down, fingers spreading over the expanse of Derek's sides, his thumbs brushing against the hem and then sliding under them, under the elastic band of Derek's boxers. 

"What do you want?" Derek asks, his breath soft against Stiles's face. He smells like Spearmint. He'd probably brushed his teeth in anticipation of Stiles's visit. Stiles had, too.

"I want you for your mind," Stiles says. He gets a genuine smile from Derek for that one. "I want you to carry me to bed again, because apparently the caveman thing really does it for me, and then I want to get naked." 

"Do you have anything in mind after that?" Derek asks. Stiles shakes his head. Derek's hands are still gently cupping his face. "I've got some ideas. Can we talk about them now?" 

"Yeah, sure--dirty talk is good." 

"Not dirty talk. Negotiations. You're young, and even if you weren't, you might say yes to something in the heat of the moment that you wouldn't say yes to otherwise. I want my yes's in advance." There's something hunted in Derek's expression. Derek's learned from past mistakes. 

"Okay. Hit me with it. Not literally, I don't think I'm into spanking. Unless you're talking about your dick. You could totally hit me in the face with your dick. Actually, I think that would--" 

"After I carry you to my bed," Derek says, both of his thumbs coming to rest over Stiles's lips, quieting him. "I want to rim you. Put you on your front, and lick your hole. Put a pillow under your hips and see if you can come just from rubbing yourself off on it while I fuck you with my tongue." 

Derek sounds like he's reciting a grocery list. Stiles sounds like he's just run a marathon, breath whistling in and out of him. "If you want to come a second time, I'd like to--I had other ideas, but maybe we could just..." Derek presses their hips together and thrusts, just once, and Stiles can almost hear his dick crying 'Mercy!' 

"Oh my god I want to climb you like a tree right now. Yes, yes, yes, a world of yes." 

"If I told you to hold onto the headboard while I rim you," Derek asks, still sounding impossibly calm, "would you do it?" 

"I've been, uh--I've been following your directions pretty much since this started. I'll--" He's seen and read enough porn that he knows they're starting to tread new territory. "I'm fine with you telling me what to do. If I want you stop, I'll--I'll safeword." He can feel himself blush and curses his blood flow, because he'd much rather look confident and self-assured instead of mortified. "Do you know what that is?" 

"Yes," Derek says, sounding amused and turned on at the same time. He's staring at Stiles's mouth. "I've--I have a lot of experience in that area." 

Stiles just about comes in his pants. But, thankfully, he doesn't, because he made a promise to himself that he is not going to do that again, it is _so uncomfortable_. "You--you do?"

"Yes. But that's...it's not something I want to get into yet. I just want you to hold onto the headboard like a good boy." _Jesus God_ , yes, apparently Stiles's dick wants Derek to call him that about a million times. "Do you have a safeword in mind?" 

"I was thinking just red for stop, yellow if I want you to check-in with me or slow down, green for good?" 

"You're the sexiest traffic light I've ever wanted to dominate," Derek says drily. 

"You just made a joke. Are you broken?" 

"No, I'm green," Derek says. "And I want you to wrap your arms around my neck now." Stiles does, and Derek lifts him off the ground like he's a barbell with no weights on the end. "I want to take care of you," Derek says, while Stiles's dick is practically crying about the fact that if he wasn't still wearing jeans he could rub his cock against Derek's abs and die a happy man. 

"I always trust you to take care of me," Stiles says, when Derek lays him down on the bed and moves him to the center of it, Stiles's hands within reaching distance of the headboard. Derek slowly stops moving, like someone's pressed _pause_ on him, and it takes Stiles saying, "Derek?" to get him moving again. 

"You're unbelievable," Derek says, like that's any kind of explanation. 

"In a good way, or a bad way?" 

"In an 'I'd rip that shirt right off of you if it wasn't your favorite Captain America t-shirt' kind of way," Derek says. 

Stiles's chest constricts, because he doesn't think even his dad knows that this is his favorite Cap shirt, and then he's kissing Derek, sliding his tongue into Derek's mouth the way Derek had done to him last time. One of his hands is on the back of Derek's neck, which Animal Planet's wolf special had said was a bad idea, but he can't help himself. He doesn't let go until Derek says, "Take your clothes off," with his eyes glowing blue. 

Stiles pulls his shirts off, Cap and also a layer of flannel, because it's cold, and--and he's used to covering up the body that Derek actually seems to find attractive, given that he's eyeing Stiles the way Stiles’s dad eyes meat lover's pizza. 

"You could take my pants off for me," Stiles says. "If you want?" 

Derek doesn't say anything, but he kisses a line from Stiles's belly button to the waistband of Stiles's jeans, and keeps licking and kissing until he lifts Stiles's hips off the bed with one hand and tugs his jeans and boxers down with the other. 

"Strength is already on my list of kinks," Stiles says to the ceiling, because if he looks at Derek he's going to straight-up jizz until he blacks out, "but I think I'm going to have to underline it. Highlight it. Surround it with little hearts." 

"Do your feet get cold?" Derek asks, sitting at the foot of the bed, Stiles's ankles in his hands. Stiles stares at him. "Do you want your socks on or off?" 

"Socks off," Stiles says. "It's warm in here, and socks are unsexy. But you asking about it is sexy. Everything you do is sexy. And nice. Nice Derek," he says, like he'd praise a dog. He forgets his teasing a second later, because Derek tears his socks off and then crawls back up the bed and lays down on top of Stiles. 

They're chest to chest, and the warmth and solidity of Derek's body is enough to distract from the discomfort of Derek's denim rubbing against Stiles's dick. Derek feels warm, his body temperature definitely running a few degrees higher than a human's--Stiles sternly tells the rambly part of his brain to shut up about werewolf research and focus on the fact that when Derek breathes, Stiles can feel his ribs move; when Stiles puts his hands on Derek's shoulders, he finds a new territory of smooth skin that he needs to explore. 

"On your belly," Derek says, after licking Stiles's right nipple, once and only once, because he is an evil tease. _Evil_. Derek smiles when Stiles covers the nipple with his hand and whines. 

Apparently, Stiles is taking too long, because the next thing he knows he's lying on his front. 

"Strength kink," he says into the pillows. "Many gold stars. Many underlines." 

Derek rearranges the pillows until Stiles's hips are lifted off the bed and angled to Derek’s satisfaction. Derek's sheets are really soft, and Stiles is already hard, so he's pretty sure Derek's plan of making Stiles come without any manual stimulation is totally going to work. Derek's hands start at the base of Stiles's neck and track down his sides, warm and lightly callused, before coming to rest on his asscheeks. 

"You look beautiful," Derek says. 

Stiles wonders if Derek can sense the blush that Stiles knows is covering his face and probably spreading to his chest, too. 

"Hands on the headboard," Derek says. His voice is less calm, and his hands are kneading Stiles's ass in a steady pattern that stops when Stiles grasps a rung with each hand and holds on. Derek doesn't say anything else. His hands don't start moving again. 

Stiles is starting to feel uncomfortable. "If I'm doing this wrong, just tell me what to change," he says, because Derek has been making him feel _wanted_ and Stiles wants it to stay that way. 

"No, no, you're--I just…" Derek says, his hands smoothing up and back down Stiles's back one more time. "I can't believe I get to have you like this." 

His hands part Stiles's cheeks before Stiles can process that, much less _respond_ to it, because Derek's--Derek's licking his hole. 

He's seen rimming in porn. A lot, because he watches a lot of porn, and a lot of porn has rimming, and most of the times he's fast-forwarded to get to the fucking, which he will _never do again_ , because nothing has ever felt as good as this feels. Derek's beard scratches against his skin, but only barely, because Derek's broad hands have his cheeks spread so wide. Derek's mouth is covering his hole, and his tongue--

His tongue is licking tiny little circles around the puckered skin, then tracing lines from the center, where the nerve endings feel like they're catching on fire, out to the skin that's sensitive but not nearly as needy. Derek pulls back and Stiles actually sobs at the lack of contact. 

"Please don't stop," he says, "I'm still holding on, I haven't touched myself, I'll say your name when I come, just like last time, I-- _Derek_." The hands on his asscheeks squeeze tight enough to hurt. 

"I want you to talk while I rim you. I want to know what you like and what you don't like. Tell me more or less, tell me left or right or center. Green?"

"Green," Stiles says, pressing his face into the mattress, because now he feels like he's about to cry for some stupid reason. (Because Derek had said earlier that all he wants is to make Stiles feel good. He’s never been the center of anyone's focus like this before. He feels selfish, and wanted, and translucent.)

"Lick me again," he says, trying to sound firm. 

Derek dives in like he'd been waiting for the invitation, but only for a few seconds. "Tell me how," Derek growls, pulling back for a moment. "Keep talking."

"Do the--the circle again, circles--" Derek's tongue starts out moving lightly, but presses harder and harder until Stiles feels like Derek's digging through to the core of him. Stiles mostly just says, "Yes," but he tries to be specific when he can. When Derek accidentally scrapes his beard against the sensitive skin, Stiles gasps and says, "Do that again. Your beard." 

He's glad he has the headboard, then, because at first he pulls way--it hurts, it's rough on a place on his body that he's barely explored before, a part of his body that's only ever known pleasure, and _pain_ there is so bad it's blinding. 

Seconds later Derek scrapes him again and Stiles shouts, rough and loud, before he uses the leverage of his hands to push back against Derek's face. 

"Lick me," Stiles says, "but do that, too, every so often do that." 

"I’ve got it now,” Derek says. “Got you. So I want you to try and stay quiet until you come. Can you do that for me?" 

"I don't know," Stiles gasps, because as soon as Derek finishes asking his question the tip of his tongue tickles at Stiles's opening. 

"Try. Or--how about this: make sounds if you _need_ to, but no more words. Red, yellow, or green?"

"Green," Stiles says. "I'll try."

After that he falls apart. 

He's never been denied words like this before, and searching for them, for something to hold onto, leaves him with the memory of Derek saying _Keep your hands there_ and _I get to have you like this_ , which are the most important words Stiles can find right now. 

Derek starts fucking Stiles with his tongue and Stiles stops trying to hold back his orgasm. Derek growls with satisfaction when Stiles's hips begins to move, and the vibration makes every part of Stiles's body spasm for a second. 

He wants to talk. He wants to swear at Derek, wants to tease him, but he--instead, he's just loud. He'd be embarrassed at the sounds that are coming out of him, but he can't think enough to filter them. 

It's just him and Derek, and Derek wants to hear him. 

Derek's very nice pillowcase is about to be ruined. Stiles is seconds away from coming, because Derek's hands are going to leave bruises again, and the irritation from his beard is going to last for days. When Derek pulls back to tell him something else, he moves a hand to press his thumb against Stiles's hole, like he'd known it hurt Stiles to be empty the last time Derek had pulled way (like Derek wants to push that thumb inside of Stiles, spit-slick and slow). 

"You make me so hard," Derek says, his thumb rubbing circles and promising a deeper stretch. "Stiles, watching you--the sounds you make--you get me hard. Make me want to come. For you," Derek says.

Stiles says, "Derek," and part of it's because he wants to say _thank you_ or _let me see your dick pretty please_ or _you make me feel so good too_ , but then he just keeps saying Derek's name because he wants to come. His hands are slick with sweat, but he's still push/pulling himself to get friction on his cock, to get the movement of Derek's tongue to imitate the rhythm he imagines will be there if Derek puts him on his belly like this again and fucks him. 

Derek scrapes his beard over Stiles one last time, then fucks Stiles's hole with his tongue as hard as he can, twisting, pushing against the sides, driving into him until Stiles feels like he's going to die from it. All it takes is Derek humming in satisfaction, his thumbs stretching Stiles's hole even wider, and Stiles's dick goes off like a geyser. 

He's never orgasmed without his hand on his dick before, and his right hand lets go of the headboard without thinking about it. Then Derek's hand is around his wrist, holding him down. Derek uses his other hand to stroke Stiles through the last throes of one of the best orgasms he's ever had. 

He cries out at the loss of Derek's tongue, but then his body is seizing again, and Derek's bare chest presses against his back. He whimpers as his orgasm goes on, and on, until Derek kisses the back of his neck and stops stroking him. 

"I took my hand off the headboard," Stiles says dumbly, blinking at a world that's gone blurry around the edges. "You caught me." He flexes his hand in Derek's grip. 

"It’s fine,” Derek says. Stiles likes when Derek lies on top of him. He can feel Derek breathing. Can feel the vibrations of his voice. "We'll work on it some other time." Gently, Derek pries Stiles's other hand from the rung he's still clinging to, and rolls him onto his back. 

Derek licks him clean again. Throws the dirty pillow on the floor. "You like the taste of my come," Stiles says, unnecessarily. He blinks some more. The world's still a bit blurry. "I came for you." 

"Yeah, you did," Derek says with a smile, crawling up the bed until he's lying by Stiles's side. "Put both your hands on your chest?" Stiles does, and Derek wraps one hand around both of Stiles's wrists. It's not a secure grip. Derek's fingers don't touch, but it makes Stiles focus on his body, on Derek, instead of the whirl that the rest of the world has become. 

"You did so good," Derek murmurs into his ear. "So good. So responsive. So strong." _Strong_ , which is not a word Stiles would have come up with. He rolls it over in his mind while Derek kisses his shoulder, and decides he likes it. 

It's a long time before the world comes back into focus, instead of just Derek and the water Derek tells him to drink and the comfortable positions Derek moves him into and the praise spilling out of Derek's mouth; more words than Stiles has ever heard him use before. 

"You said I made you hard," Stiles says, things coming back to him in bits and pieces. He scooches himself over on the bed to check for evidence. Derek's jeans are still on; his dick is visibly hard inside of them. "You don’t have to do anything,” Stiles says, “but it would make me feel good if you came with me. Except earlier you said you--you don't like to come?" 

"I don't usually like to make myself feel..." Derek's looking pretty much everywhere except at Stiles. He might be blushing. It's adorable. 

"...out of control? Spastic? Like you're going through _la petite mort_?"

"I don't like to make myself feel good," Derek says, his jaw clenching tight. "I don't deserve that. I don't deserve you either, I know better, but I'm--I'm selfish, and I--" 

Stiles wraps himself around Derek like an octopus, because he thinks one of them is going to break if Derek keeps talking. "You deserve so many nice things," he whispers. His voice is muffled against Derek's chest, but he knows Derek can hear him; knows Derek can tell he's not lying. "You deserve breakfast in bed, and for someone else to randomly pay for your coffee some day, and to find a four-leaf clover without even looking for it, and to get your cheeks pinched by old ladies--"

"You're not making sense." Derek carefully wraps his arms around Stiles. For the first time, Derek's touch feels unsure. Dude can rim Stiles till he screams, but apparently he's still working on the hug. 

"I don't know if you deserve _me_ , because I'm hell of a handful, but I'm also not an _object_ , and I chose to be with you. Choose. Present tense." Derek makes a small sound, deep in his chest, that Stiles wouldn't have heard if he weren't pressed so close. "Bad things have happened to you," Stiles says, deliving the understatement of the century. "And you've had to do bad things. But none of that makes you a bad person." 

Derek doesn’t do anything for a long time. Eventually he wriggles out of Stiles's grip and stands up. Unbuttons the top of his jeans. Unzips them; every movement separate and deliberate. He pulls his jeans off leg by leg, then takes his boxers off after that. Standing back up after taking his boxers off is the only thing he does slowly. Revealing the impossible beauty of his chest, the dip of muscle and bone around his hips, the dark hair on his thighs and between his legs. And his dick, which is hard, red, and pretty. 

"I want to lick your dick," Stiles says, his brain-to-mouth filter having wandered off at some point. 

"Not tonight," Derek says. He smiles, just a little one, and of all the impossible hotness standing before Stiles, that's his favorite part.

"But it's so pretty," he says, with a small smile of his own.

"Next time. If you're good," Derek says, his right hand slowly stroking his cock. 

Stiles's breath catches. _If he's good_. (He's been not quite good enough a lot lately. Too human, too stupid, too late.) Again, his mouth moves faster than his brain. "I moved my hand. Earlier, when I was holding on--" 

Derek gets on the bed, on his knees, next to Stiles. "As long as you do your best for me, I won't ever be disappointed." 

"Green," Stiles says softly, because he's always been good at trying, and he thinks Derek might understand even when Stiles fails. He thinks if anyone could understand that, it would be Derek. "Now make yourself feel good. Whatever that means for you. Come, if you want to. For me. On me?" 

"On you?" Derek asks, his eyes widening.

Stiles wriggles on the bed until he's stretched out fully. His hands are crossed in the center of his chest, but after a moment, he lifts them over his head and holds onto the rungs again. "On me. But only if you want to. Only if it feels good." 

Derek stares at Stiles, eyes running up and down the lines of his body, and then he just looks at Stiles's hands. "This feels good," Derek says, in a quiet whisper, a tremor running through him. "I want to do this." 

It takes Derek a while. He starts slow, teases himself, plays with his balls, rubs at just the head when he gets too close. Stiles relaxes into the bed and watches with half-closed eyes, feeling completely satisfied. 

At some point, Stiles has an idea, and says, "Will you say my name when you come, like I do for you?" 

Apparently that does it for Derek, because he growls it out immediately, " _Stiles_ ," just once--and comes, on Stiles's chest, his arms, his neck. Derek strokes himself through it, panting, bent over Stiles's body. It looks like it hurts, but in a safe, normal, feels-too-good kind of way. 

“Are you okay?” Stiles asks, when Derek stops moving. "You green?" Derek nods, and licks his come from Stiles's body. Then he lies down, body curled like a parenthesis bracketing one side of Stiles’s body.

"You came," Stiles says, "and it's not even Wednesday." 

"Stop being smug. It's unattractive." Derek puts his hands back around Stiles's wrists, carefully, bringing them back down to his chest. Stiles had forgotten he was still holding onto the headboard. "You look tired," Derek says. "I want to make you dinner." Derek hesitates before he stands up. "Is that okay?"

Stiles smiles. The world looks the same as it had before Derek had caveman-carried him to bed. Not sharper, not blurrier. A bit darker, since the sun's gone down. Stiles feels different, though. 

"Great," he says. "The greenest of greens." He curls up on his side and watches Derek move around the kitchen, completely naked, and lets his worries go for a while, like a stack of papers that no one needs to read, like easy questions someone else can answer for a while.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback is really appreciated. :-)
> 
> I also have a tumblr now!


	4. i keep my promises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stiles has had a bad fucking day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written because I've had a bad fucking day, too.

The next time Stiles comes to Derek, he smells like sulfur. There’s something deeper than anger buzzing under his skin. It makes Derek’s nostrils itch. 

He pulls on some clothes and comes downstairs after he hears Stiles's jeep pull up, but he still doesn't get to the door before Stiles, who bangs on it like it's personally offended him. When Derek gets it open, Stiles storms in, wrestling with the straps of his backpack, banging into the coffee table (and then the couch) before tripping over his own shoelaces. 

It's funnier to watch the comedy routine that is Stiles when Stiles isn't geting angrier and angrier with every stumble.

Derek stays by the door, since that seems safest, and asks, "Bad day?" 

Stiles turns back to look at him, eyes practically glowing with fury, and Derek wonders if perhaps he should get his claws out, or hide in the hallway in preparation for an attack. 

"Yes," Stiles bites out. "Yes, I had a _bad day_." He throws his backpack on the couch and stands there, glaring at nothing, shoulders heaving. 

Derek knows Stiles gets panic attacks sometimes, but this just seems like anger, and frustration, which Derek understands. He just doesn't know how to deal with it when it’s Stiles, who can’t shift or howl or hurt himself, knowing that it will heal. "Do you...want to talk about it?" 

Stiles half-turns to him. "No. Talking is not why I came here." 

That makes sense. Stiles had a bad day and he came here. If he'd wanted to talk, he'd have gone to Scott. If he'd wanted comfort, he'd have gone to his dad. If he'd wanted help sorting out his problems, he'd have gone to Lydia. He'd come to Derek because he wanted none of those things (or maybe all of them; maybe he wants too much). Derek's just...he'll give Stiles everything he can. 

"You don’t have to tell me about your day, just--are you really in a good place for us to--to do this right now?" Derek asks carefully, closing the door and turning back to Stiles. 

Stiles's eyes are closed tight; his fists and shoulders stiff with tension. "I can’t get my brain to shut up," Stiles whispers. He smells more like Adderall than usual, a faint chalky note underscoring his normal scent. The bags under his eyes are proof enough that worry and stress have been keeping him up at nights. “I feel like my skin is going to crawl off my body. I feel like I’m going to punch something, or cry, or scream--" His voice is getting louder and louder, tearing with tension, but he gets quiet, breath shuddering through his body, when he meets Derek's eyes and says, "Please. Will you help me?” 

"Okay," Derek says, because he recognizes and hates the scent wafting off of Stiles right now. He’ll keep track of Stiles as much as he can through scent, instinct, and what he’s learned of Stiles’s body language. He’ll stick to things they’ve done before, and things Stiles has said _yes_ to in the past. “We're going to use red, yellow, and green, but I'm also going to listen to 'stop' and 'wait' or whatever else you need to say. You got that?" 

"I've been speaking in full sentences since I was two, Derek, I don't need a fucking refresher course on the _color wheel_ \--" 

"Good for you. Now sit down on the couch." 

Stiles turn fully towards Derek, his mouth open to argue back. Derek moves faster than Stiles can talk and slams him back into the couch (careful to miss Stiles's backpack, tossed in the left corner; careful because Stiles is human and the last thing Derek wants to do is hurt him). Derek keeps his hands on Stiles's tense shoulders, holding him down. Stiles had said that he felt like he was going to come out of his skin, so Derek is going to remind him of where he begins and ends. He's going to run his hands over every inch of it that he can reach so that Stiles will want to be back in his body.

Derek kneels in front of Stiles, who glares down at him. Already his scent is shifting into something warmer, spicier. "I'm going to take your pants off, then suck you until you beg me to come. Once I think that you deserve it, I'm going to take you to my bed, and make you fuck yourself on my fingers until you come all over yourself." 

"When did you get so much better at planning?" Stiles says, his voice biting. His hands are skittering like frantic hummingbirds, landing on his thighs, the couch, Derek's shoulders, alighting for a moment before moving away again. He's not looking for something to hold onto. He's just too gone to focus. 

"Ever since you started listening to what I tell you to do. Put your hands in my hair. Leave them there until I tell you otherwise." 

He strips Stiles's jeans and boxers off as fast as he can and throws them on his bare metal floor. (He has been thinking about getting area rugs. Ikea.com has been very helpful.)

Stiles isn't hard yet, and his hands are restless where he's touching Derek, tugging and twisting through his hair. Derek licks Stiles to hardness, but even that isn't enough to stop Stiles's feet from bouncing on the floor, or get his hands to stay still, to bring Stiles under control. Derek deepthroats Stiles for a while, because he likes making Stiles feel good, and it buys him some time to think things through. 

This isn't enough. Nothing they've done before is going to be enough. This isn't how he wanted to start making things more serious--this isn't careful restraints and quiet words and conversations, but maybe they can still have that. Maybe Derek won't fuck things up by giving into the desperation pouring out of Stiles's body, the _please_ that escapes him when tears start pooling at the corners of his eyes. 

Stiles has said _Probably no_ to spanking before, or Derek would take him to bed and let pain take him over. He'd tie Stiles up, but that's _not_ something he's going to with Stiles's mental capacity at less than 100%

"I want you to get on your knees and suck me off,” Derek says, because it’s something that Stiles has said he wanted, but not something Derek’s given him yet. Something that will demand Stiles's focus and arouse his curiousity. Maybe keep him distracted for a while. “How do you feel about that?" 

Stiles's fingernails dig into Derek's skull. "What if I said I felt terrible about it?" Stiles says. He sounds snarky and mean.

"Then we'll do something else," Derek says. Stiles rolls his eyes, and Derek just--he's losing control of Stiles, and that's not good. Not helpful. He puts a knee between Stiles's legs to push himself up onto the couch and wraps a hand around Stiles's throat. 

"You can say no to me, but don't you dare make fun of this," Derek growls. He tightens his grip, just enough to feel Stiles's pulse quicken, before he lets go. "I want you naked and on your knees in the next fifteen seconds, or I'm going to kick you out of here wearing whatever clothes you have left on." 

While Stiles strips, Derek grabs a pillow and tosses it on the floor. Derek positions it so that he can lean against the arm of the couch while Stiles blows him. He has a feeling his legs are going to go weak. (They do sometimes, when subs go down on him.) He doesn't actually keep count of the seconds, but he says, "Good boy," when Stiles scrambles in place. Stiles shivers under his praise. "Kneel on the pillow." Stiles shifts the pillow until he's steady on it, then puts his hands on Derek's hips. 

Of course, Stiles then starts talking. "Don't you have to take your pants--" 

"Shut up. You don't get to talk yet," Derek says. "Not unless it's actually important." He can see the witty cogs turning in Stiles's mind, because Stiles is in a perpetual _get to the last word first_ race with the rest of the world. 

Derek strips his t-shirt off, since that is actually a good way to get Stiles to shut up. "If you'd been a good boy when you came in," Derek murmurs, "and simply asked for help, I'd let you be the one to strip me." Instead, Stiles had snarked and pushed, and maybe, maybe that's the way it'll always be, and Derek will learn to read those signs the same way he could interpret, "I had a bad day, please fuck me senseless." But if he can get Stiles to honestly verbalize his needs, then Derek's going to try and get him there. 

Stiles hands are on Derek's hips. He's staring at Derek's stomach like he wants to lean forward and touch it, but he stays still. His face is maybe half a foot away from Derek's groin when Derek starts unbuttoning his jeans. Stiles's eyes go wide. 

"You said you wanted to lick my dick," Derek says, pulling the zipper halfway down. "I think I might let you. Put your hands on the couch so they’re not in my way." Stiles's hands slide around Derek's hips until they're brushing against Derek's buttocks. His hands are steadier now, even though they're touching Derek so lightly he can barely feel them through the denim. "Keep them there." 

He makes a show of undressing himself, because Stiles likes Derek’s body (and his mind, and personality, and smile, which Derek knows, because Stiles’s text messages are random and complimentary and frequent). Derek undoes his jeans, then strokes himself through his boxers for a while before pulling them down to mid-thigh. Stiles slides the clothes the rest of the way off Derek's body, following orders, and when Derek tells him to put his hands back, Stiles's heartbeat speeds up. Derek hasn't been part of many scenes where the dom's been naked while their sub's partially clothed, but it's working for him, and it seems to be working for Stiles.

"If you want to lick it," Derek says, holding his cock in his hand, "then lick it." 

He's already hard. Had gotten hard when he had Stiles's dick in his mouth, because he seriously gets off on giving head, especially when it's Stiles (moaning and swearing, thigh muscles twitching, every taste new and just for Derek).

The first touch of Stiles's tongue on his cock takes the breath out of him. It's tentative; careful. Just a lick at the tip, like Derek's precum is the last bit of milkshake dripping off a straw. Stiles licks his lips afterwards, then leans forward and swirls his tongue around Derek's cock slowly.

"This is your first time sucking cock, isn't it?" Derek asks. He knows the answer is yes, but he waits for Stiles to nod. "Then you better work hard to make it good." 

Stiles pulls back for a moment, then bends his head down, looking at the floor. Derek doesn't like that Stiles is hiding his face, looking away, but Derek may never get over the pulse of arousal that he feels when Stiles bares his neck. "I just have to try my best," Stiles mumbles. "That's the deal." 

That's what Derek had said before. Something that he'd murmured in the midst of a lot of other reassurances and comforts. Something Derek hadn't particularly fastened onto, but had meant something to Stiles. He puts a tight hand on the back of Stiles's neck, the same way he'd do to a fellow wolf--accepting submission, accepting responsiblity for taking control. It's the best way he knows to say _I've got you_. Out loud, he says, "If you try your best, I'll be proud of you." 

"Happy with me," Stiles says, like he's adding something to Derek's statement, not contradicting or correcting him. 

"I promise." 

Stiles lets a breath out, a breath so long it empties his lungs and makes his next breath in deep and clean. His neck stays bared until Derek moves his hand around to cup Stiles's chin and tilt his face back up. Stiles looks calmer; looser. 

Derek pulls Stiles up to standing (he'd do the caveman lift that Stiles likes, but his knees went weak the second Stiles had hummed curiously with his tongue brushing against Derek's balls) and holds him for a moment. Kisses Stiles on the mouth for the first time since he arrived. 

"Feeling a bit better?" Derek asks carefully. Stiles nods. He doesn't seem angry anymore, not frustrated, but Derek knows it's more than just fatigue that's still twitching angrily through his body. "Can I still take you to bed and finger you until you orgasm?" Derek asks. 

Stiles's body goes stiff, and he grinds against Derek. They both gasp when they realize that neither of them has their pants on and their dicks are lined up together and _oh god_ Stiles just keeps moving like that, over and over, until Derek grabs his hips and growls. 

"Fingering," he says, because as good as it would feel to rut against Stiles's skin until their come mixed together and Derek licked it off, that's not going to do as much for Stiles as Derek's other plan will. 

"I'm--I'm--" Stiles tries to rub against him again and Derek tightens his hold. "I'm gonna do what you tell me," Stiles says, swallowing hard. "I'm going to try, to try my best. Like last time. Because it's..." 

"Good," Derek says, instead of forcing Stiles to pull himself together enough to verbalize something he might not completely understand yet. Derek ignores his own body's complaints (he would very much like to collapse on the couch and not move for a while), and carries Stiles to the bed. 

"Take your shirt off," he orders absentmindedly. While Stiles does that, Derek leans over and looks for lube in the drawer of his bedside table. He's been stocking up. He'd bought a bunch of different flavored lubes and massage oils because he thought Stiles might get a kick out of them: Pina Colada, Sex on the Beach, Raspberry Fusion. He randomly grabs the Mixed Berry lube from the jumble of containers in the drawer, and when he turns back to the bed, he sees Stiles already spread open for him. His arms are crossed at the center of his chest and his thighs are wide apart. He's looking to Derek with nervous eyes. 

"You're unbelievable," Derek says, because he couldn't have dreamed anything as beautiful as this if he tried. 

"Unbelievable in the good way," Stiles says, the words almost question instead of a tease. 

"So good," Derek says. "The best." Stiles's eyes close, and he nods, tears gathering in the corners of his eyes, like he'd known what Derek's response would be, but desperately needed to hear it anyway. 

He lies down next to Stiles, on top of him just enough to press Stiles's arms tighter against his chest. He kisses Stiles's jaw and cheek before he lets himself move to Stiles's mouth, which is swollen and red from the friction of Derek's cock. He keeps kissing Stiles while he opens the lube one-handed and slicks up two fingers. 

"Have you ever put anything inside of you?" Derek asks. "Fingers? Toys?" 

"A finger once," Stiles says, blushing. "I couldn't get the angle right and it just made my wrist hurt." 

"I'm going to start with one," Derek says, when the lube feels like it's warmed up enough. "Then two, when I think you're ready." He hesitates, then moves on the bed. Moves from Stiles’s side to between his legs. He spreads Stiles's legs wider and kneels between them, caressing the tense muscles. He wants this view. He wants to see the pale skin of Stiles's inner thighs, the trail of hair from his groin to his belly button, the blush spreading down his neck to his chest, almost reaching his nipples. 

"Take a picture," Stiles says, with an awkward, joking, breathless tone. "It'll last longer." 

"Maybe I'll get pictures some other day," Derek says. "I'd love to have pictures of you like this. Just..." He runs the hand that's not already tacky with lube down Stiles's side. "Just perfect for me." 

Stiles's blush deepens. "Flattery will get you--"

"Stop talking," Derek interrupts. "Unless you want to tell me how something feels, or if you need me to slow down. Otherwise, just--" 

"I don't get my words," Stiles says. His hands squeeze together, still crossed against his chest, and he closes his eyes for a moment. He says, "Green," and then looks at Derek. His heart's beating fast, but for the first time since he knocked on Derek's door like a pissed-off drum corps, his scent doesn't put Derek's nerves on edge. "Green. Aqua. Turquoise. Lapis--"

Derek moves down the bed and licks at Stiles's hole for a while, because he likes what it does to Stiles's body: the way he writhes, the way he tries and fails to keep quiet. Eventually, when Stiles's moans are loud and incoherent, Derek slides a finger in alongside his tongue. Stiles's hands scramble across the mattress and don't stop moving until he gets his hands in Derek's hair again. 

"Color?" Derek asks, because Stiles is on the edge of desperate. 

"Green, if I can keep touching you," Stiles says in a rush. "Is that okay? Or is there a reason why I can't?" 

He loves that he has Stiles's focus now. Loves that Stiles is asking for what he wants, and trusting that Derek will have a reason if he says _No._ He rubs his finger in a wide, crooked circle inside of Stiles's body, then withdraws it and kisses Stiles deeply. He lifts Stiles up for a moment and moves him so that he's propped against the headboard, supported by the mountain of pillows Cora had inexplicably bought him. It gives Stiles more leverage, more freedom to move. Will let Stiles keep touching Derek, which is something he wants; something he'd asked for. Something that Derek wants, too. 

"Better?" Derek asks. Stiles bites his lips, his arms at a better angle to run his hands through Derek's hair (which must look a mess by now; he mostly doesn't care, since Stiles doesn't seem to mind), and settle his long fingers on Derek's shoulders. Stiles's hands are splayed wide, and for a moment his thumbs and pointer fingers touch to make a ring around Derek's neck. 

"Save that for next time," Derek says, shrugging Stiles's hands into a different position, feeling vaguely guilty. "Don't grab my neck today. Shoulders, arms, hair, face--everything else is fair game." 

"Okay," Stiles says. "Thanks--thanks for telling me." His head drops back against the wall and Derek just looks at him, at his lips, his cheeks, his closed, tensing eyes. Then he goes back to Stiles's hole and licks it, fucks it with one finger and then two, stretching and playing and exploring. He watches Stiles's face contort and smooth back out as Derek's fingers twist and press and pull. He watches Stiles as Derek uses just his mouth and sucks at Stiles's hole until Stiles screams with the unexpected pleasure. He fucks Stiles until the loneliness that is woven into Stiles's scent, one thread among many, is overwhelmed with precome, sweat, and lust. 

"Derek," Stiles begs, the first coherent word he's said since _Thank you._ "I’m gonna come. Can I? Please, can I--" 

Derek remembers being fifteen, and Kate laughing at him for coming so easily. He doesn't want that shame to be part of Stiles. Stiles wants to come. "I'm going to put my mouth back on your cock. I want you to put your hands on my head. And I want you to fuck my mouth until you come, as hard as you can, whenever you want to." 

Derek shifts himself up the mattress to take Stiles in his mouth. When Derek moves, his cock rubs against the covers, and he realizes how close he is to coming himself. He hesitates for a moment, because he's--this is new territory for him. He keeps his right hand between Stiles's spread legs, finger fucking him with his fingers tilted against Stiles’s prostate in a fast, steady rhythm, but he wraps his left hand around his cock and lets himself thrust into it with the same pace that Stiles is fucking his mouth. 

It feels like his body is going to separate. Going to float apart in three different directions: his dick, his fingers inside Stiles's tight, clenching hole, his mouth and throat around Stiles's cock. (He thinks he could suck Stiles for hours, and maybe he will, if some day that Stiles comes over lazy and curious, just wanting to play.) 

For now he sucks as hard as he can, trying to match the movement of his fingers to the pace Stiles sets with the thrusts of his hips. But Stiles loses the pace almost every other thrust, so eventually Derek takes over and starts fucking his mouth on Stiles's cock, making himself practically gag every time. Something about that does it for Stiles, who throws his head back and babbles, using words that make Derek smile, even though Stiles is saying things other than Derek's name. They're all desperate, happy words-- _please, yes, thank you, more_ \--so Derek will let him get away with it this time. (This time is different. This time Stiles needs Derek to take care of him in a way that doesn't involve rules Derek made that Stiles will have to pay for breaking.)

When Stiles pulls himself together enough to hold Derek's head down on his cock for longer than is actually comfortable, not letting go when Derek gags, and then groans his name, saying, “Derek,” as if he's something impossible, something Stiles is grateful for--Derek comes. For the first time since Jennifer, and the gentle spell she'd woven around his healing body, he's momentarily helpless with pleasure. 

Embarrassingly, he comes before Stiles does, his hips thrusting erratically against his hand and the mattress, moaning around Stiles's cock. Stiles says, "Derek, did you--are you--Jesus fuck, god, you _are_ ," and something between a cry and a punched-out breath follows his words as he comes in Derek's mouth. Derek keeps moving his own hips lazily, doing his best to finish himself off using his non-dominant hand. He keeps his fingers inside of Stiles until Stiles stops moving. 

He swallows Stiles's come, licks up the drops that had escaped his lips, and licks Stiles's hole for good measure, to make Stiles whine with pleasure that wrings another spurt of come from his softening cock. 

Derek strokes his hands over the stretches of Stiles's skin that he can easily reach before he goes to the bathroom to grab some wet wipes. He cleans himself, and then Stiles. He cleans the blankets up as best he can, but he's going to have to wash them to get the scent out. (Or he could not wash them, at least not yet, and go to bed tonight with Stiles's scent intertwined with his own.)

“You okay?” Derek asks, grabbing a warm washcloth and wiping the remnants of sweat from Stiles's body, searching to make sure he hadn’t left any accidental bruises, looking for hidden tension in Stiles’s smiling face and sprawled limbs.

“Yeah,” Stiles says. “Come here?” Derek goes to him quickly. He likes Stiles like this, grabbing Derek’s head and kissing him messily until he lets go with a happy sigh. "I think I should be the one to make _you_ dinner, this time," Stiles says. "You--I really--thank you. Thus, dinner." Derek checks Stiles over one last time to make sure that he's relaxed, eyes still glazed over, smiling. Drifting. "But I also can't move. Delivery?" 

Derek grabs take-out menus and lets Stiles pick out a Chinese restaurant, and the appetizers, and some desserts, only taking a stand on the entrees because, yes, Derek _does_ want three different dishes with beef in them, thank you very much. 

Derek grabs a towel to cover himself up when he answers the door. He gives the delivery guy an extra big tip to make up for it. When Derek comes back to bed with bag of food in one hand and the knot of the towel in the other, Stiles says the delivery guy should have put the bills back in Derek's towel. 

"Although then you would have owed him a lap dance." Derek flashes his fangs for a moment before spreading the food out on the bed. "Just FYI, all your lap dance are belong to me now," Stiles informs him. 

Derek looks at him funny. "Either you've gone stupider than usual, or that's just not a reference I understand." 

"You poor, uneducated soul. I will educate you in the ways of the internet. But first, pass me the egg rolls. And some duck sauce." 

Derek passes them over, then leans back against the headboard. He's halfway through his meal (which maybe could have used one chicken dish, because all his entrees do kind of taste the same), when he clears his throat, and asks the question that's been on a quiet repeat in the back of his head since Stiles first stormed in. 

"Do you, uh--do you want to talk about your day?" 

Stiles is sprawled on his stomach, still naked (and relaxed about it, which Derek likes). Stiles fiddles with his chopsticks, which he’s been using incorrectly. "Not really," Stiles says with a shrug. "Or, maybe? I don't..." He looks at Derek with a smile. "My shitty trig test isn't that important. I’ll study more for the next exam. Make the time for extra credit.” He stares down at his fingers. Derek almost doesn’t care that the chopsticks are crooked, since he likes watching Stiles’s fingers move. 

Stiles takes a deep breath and Derek sees some of the tension slip back into his body. "I haven't told Scott about me and you yet. And tomorrow I'm going to have to talk to my dad about the bottle of his whiskey I found hidden in the cereal cabinet, and that conversation will suck, but we'll work it out." His chopsticks twitch and lo mein falls on the sheets. "My Adderall dosage isn't working as well as it should, but my regular appointment with the doc is coming up soon, so." He picks up the fallen lo mein with his fingers and eats it. "A lot of things really suck right now. But they're all...I can deal with them. I'll figure them out." 

Derek reaches down and puts his hand between Stiles's shoulder blades, right where his own tattoo lies. "Thanks for telling me." 

"Yeah, well. Thanks for..." Stiles waves his chopsticks in Derek's general direction. "All of your...you-ness. You really--this--it helped." 

Derek thinks about it, then smiles, and moves his hand out of the way so that he can press a kiss over Stiles's spine. "Anytime."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a [tumblr](http://hoosierbitch.tumblr.com) now!
> 
> Feedback on AO3 is still really appreciated. :-) Thank you!


	5. hope there's someone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek gets injured in a fight. It happens pretty much on a weekly basis; he's used to it. Someone following him home afterwards to take care of him? That's new.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Advisory: Derek's got some bad injuries, but they're not graphically described. References to Derek's past (unhealthy) relationship with Jennifer. 
> 
> Notes: Title taken from the Antony and the Johnsons' song ["Hope There's Someone."](http://youtu.be/mNqrGZqqWM8)

A knock on his door is pretty much the last thing Derek wants to deal with. He just got the damn thing _closed_. Even the simple movement of sliding it shut had torn something in his stomach back open. The towel he'd been using to keep his insides...well, _inside_ , is pretty much worthless at this point. Soaked through with blood. It begins to slip through his hands, slick and heavy. He throws it into the corner. Or, he tries to. It lands about five feet away from him and ends up under the table. 

He's sitting on the ground with his back resting against the wall. He'd made it a couple of steps into the apartment before his legs gave out. His right thigh has four deep gashes in it, curving around the side of his leg far enough that he can’t see them in their entirety, and there's deep bruising on his face. The worst of it are the wounds on his stomach. He hasn't looked at those too closely. Hadn't needed to see it to know it was _bad_.

After the fight was over and the latest Beacon Hills murderous visitor dealt with, Derek had folded the edges of his leather jacket over his stomach, keeping everything pressed tight and hiding the worst of it. Stiles had piled Scott and Isaac into his jeep quickly, since they were both pretty bad-off. The twins had been bruised, but strong enough to get their motorcycles going and head home safely. Derek had just kept his jacket pressed over his wounds and scowled at everyone and kept quiet. 

It worked, since everyone went their separate ways, and Derek could make his way, slow and unsteady, to his car. 

He’d started keeping a stash of towels and extra shirts in the trunk a couple of weeks after he got back to Beacon, given the sheer number of times he'd ended up bleeding through his clothes. When he pressed a towel against his stomach (without actually looking at the damage) he bit through his tongue to try and keep in the howl of pain. His tongue took nearly a minute to heal. 

He drove home one-handed, going about fifteen miles an hour. He’s still not completely sure how he made it without crashing or getting pulled over. He doesn’t remember walking up to the loft. He just remembers having grabbed a second towel from the trunk before he locked it up. It’s sitting under the table in its sad puddle. Mocking him.

There's another knock. He can smell Stiles through the door. "Let me in," Stiles says, "or I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll--"

"Fuck off," Derek says. It sounds less scary than he meant it to, because being loud involves tensing his stomach muscles, most of which have been neatly torn apart. He digs his claws into his hands to keep from crying out. His body will work the poison out of his system eventually, and he'll heal--as always, without a single scar left behind. 

"Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin," Stiles says. "Or all the tea in China, or however the fuck that goes. Just open up? Please?"

Derek has basically conditioned himself to do whatever Stiles wants if he says _please_ afterwards, so he says, "Fine," and listens to Stiles talk about which of the three little pigs he'd be while slowly inching his way back up to a standing position. He has to blink tears out of his eyes; wipes them away so Stiles won't notice. 

He slides the lock open, then walks a few steps back inside before folding his jacket back across his stomach. Doing up the zipper is out of the question; he can’t move his arms enough for that. He presses his right arm over his stomach hard before saying, "It's open." 

He tries to look casual, and apparently it works, because Stiles doesn't stop talking about how the second pig wasn't that dumb, since building a house out of sticks isn't a bad idea if he made it a log cabin. 

"Why are you here?" Derek asks, trying not to show how much he's relying on the wall to keep himself upright.

"I figured I'd come help you out while you heal. Scott and Isaac have Melissa to look after them, and you got the worst of it, so...tada! I'm not a professional nurse, but I wield a mean band-aid." 

"I don't need help," Derek says, rolling his eyes. "Deaton said the poison won't stop the healing process, it'll just slow it down."

"Yeah. So until everything heals, it's going to hurt. If you don't need me to help bandage anything up, I can just hang out while you rest up and bring you food. I know healing takes a lot out of you. Cool?" Stiles squints at him when Derek stares at him, bewildered. "You've been in, like, a million fights. How are not used to this yet?"

Derek shrugs, then winces at the pain even the slight movement causes. He's not quite sure what Stiles's question is. The violence and injuries, yes, he's used to that. Someone following him home afterwards? Not so much. 

Stiles takes his hoodie off and hangs it up on the coat rack that Derek had picked out at Target. "Where's your first aid kit?" Stiles asks, rubbing his hands together like he's getting ready to start fixing a car or do some dishes. 

"I don't have one," Derek says. "Because I _don't need one_." 

Stiles points at him. Derek looks down. Both of his hands are covered in red. "Your bleeding is contradicting your talking. Won't bandages at least help while it heals? I can clean the wounds out, so you don't have to fight off infection, too." 

Derek shifts his weight uneasily. "These--stomach wounds are kind of--if you want to have sex, it's going to have to wait at least an hour." Stiles's eyes go cartoon wide. Derek, who's feeling increasingly off-balance, snaps, " _What?_ "

"Is this some twisted Florence Nightingale thing? Does 'I want to get some antibiotic cream on those wounds' translate into 'let's get it on' in werewolf?"

"Werewolf isn't a language." 

" _That is not the important part of what I said_." 

Derek fights down a pained grunt when he pushes himself upright. "Jennifer came over once. After the fight with the Alphas." 

"We were on that lacrosse trip,” Stiles says, his voice distracted. “We thought you’d died.”

“I almost did. The only reason I didn’t was that Jennifer helped me home.” He hopes that talking about his ex isn't crossing some taboo relationship line that'll make Stiles mad. "She said it was weird that I didn't have bandages too, but she helped clean the blood off. Then we--you know, we...did things. Physical contact helped. But I don't think I’m good for much right now."

"I'm not going to fuck you when your guts might spill out if you move too quickly," Stiles says, something like steel in his voice. Derek would like to complain that Stiles is exaggerating, but the gashes in his stomach are deep enough that it's not that far from true. "I think the lesson we can take away from this is that we shouldn't go to evil druids for medical assistance.” Derek doesn’t point out that she’d been the only one there to help him. The only reason he’s not dead. “Look, can I--will you just let me stay?" 

Stiles is only wearing a thin t-shirt, his jacket hung up on the coat rack that Derek only owns because Stiles cajoled him into going shopping for one, and Derek can clearly see the lines of Stiles’s hunched shoulders. Stiles looks determined and defensive all at once. 

"Yeah," Derek says finally. 

"Thank god," Stiles says, striding forward. "I swear, you're more stubborn than my dad is--" He pulls Derek's jacket away from his stomach and Derek can't help it; he makes a small, pitiful sound, somewhere between a cry and a whine. It's mortifying. 

"You should go," he says, his words more breath than sound. "I'm not--this isn't--" He doesn't want Stiles to see him like this. He's supposed to be strong for Stiles, and right now, he's weak. 

"That looks pretty bad," Stiles says. His voice is quiet and steady. He moves his hands slowly, until he's holding onto Derek's tense, bloody hands, instead of his jacket. "If there's poisonous residue in there, it's going to be deep. Can I help you get to the bathroom and wash it out?" 

"Why?" 

"Because if you try to heal around the poison, then--"

"No, I mean--" He swallows hard, tasting blood, which is not a good sign. The words hurt coming out. "Why are you here? If you want to fuck, come back tomorrow. I promise I won't die between now and then." Stiles is staring at him instead of moving towards the door. "You have better things to do." 

"No," Stiles says quietly. "Actually, being here, with you, is the most important thing I could possibly do right now."

The tension in the corners of Derek’s eyes tightens. If he could, he’d walk away from this. He doesn't like it. He doesn't like not knowing what Stiles's motives are. Doesn't know what Stiles wants or how to give it to him. 

"Has anyone helped you out after you got hurt?" Stiles asks. His hands are bloody now, from holding onto Derek's. "Other than Jennifer, who, just in case you missed the memo, _evil_."

Stiles's questions feel like he's digging his fingers into Derek's wounds, trying to get inside of him. "Deaton, if I ask. You, when Kate shot me with wolfsbane." He reaches back, trying to remember feeling pain and comfort at the same time. "When I was six I broke my arm, and my mom took the pain away until it healed." Stiles makes a small noise in the back of his throat. Derek feels instantly guilty, because he knows how much Stiles misses his mom. "Sorry, I--"

"We haven't been always been a very good pack to you, have we?" Stiles says. Derek frowns. He's the one who'd been the shitty alpha. Since he got back, he's been doing his best to be a good member of Scott's pack. What more is he supposed to do? Stiles looks grim, but he starts talking again before Derek can figure out what he means. "I'm going to take you into the bathroom to clean you up, and do everything I can to help speed up the healing process. If I do something you don't like, say red. If you want me to--"

"This isn't a scene," Derek says, startling away from Stiles. Moving away from him hurts. "I thought you didn't want sex yet, so you--"

Stiles reaches out a hand to touch Derek's face, and Derek flinches away from him. "I want to help you," Stiles says quietly, his hand still in the air, evidence that Derek’s--that Derek’s not okay. "I'm worried that I'll end up hurting you worse. Can you just use the colors? For me? The same way I trust you?"

Derek is tempted to say red, just to get Stiles to _go away_ , but then Stiles's hand actually makes contact with Derek's face. The creature who'd been punching him during the fight had been right-handed, so the left side of Derek's face is pretty bruised. The cheekbone is probably fractured. It doesn't hurt when Stiles touches him, fingertips skimming lightly over the worst of it. 

"Please?" Stiles says again. Just like before, Stiles says _please_ , and something in Derek bends. 

"Yellow," Derek says, clenching his jaw after letting the word out. 

Stiles nods. Says, "Thank you," and then, "Come with me to the bathroom?" Stiles doesn't let go of Derek's hand, but he keeps their arms loose between them instead of pulling Derek along. Derek can feel fresh blood spill from his stomach and his thigh; he stumbles, but shies away from Stiles when he reaches out. "I won't help you walk if you don't want me to," Stiles says quickly. He waits while Derek regathers himself. Doesn't let go of Derek's hand, but doesn't do anything more than wait when Derek stumbles twice more. 

Stiles lets go of his hand when they get to the bathroom, and Derek wonders if Stiles had somehow been sapping some of Derek's pain. The pain is worse when Stiles isn't touching him. 

"I'm gonna go grab scissors from your kitchen," Stiles says. "This t-shirt's just about done in, but I'm going to cut it the rest of the way off--" Derek lets the claws on his right hand come out, but Stiles says, " _Don't_ ," and Derek stops. "If you move too much, you'll hurt yourself. Just wait a minute." Stiles hesitates in the doorway. "Color?"

"I'm fine," Derek growls. 

"'Fine' isn't a color."

"Get the damn scissors or I'm going to say 'red,'" he says, the claws on both hands coming out. Derek can hear Stiles scrambling to the kitchen, fumbling in the knife drawer, sliding across the floor in his hurry to get back. His clumsy earnestness is...endearing. Familiar. "Still yellow," Derek mumbles, when Stiles starts working with the scissors. 

"Thanks for telling me," Stiles says. When he finishes with the shirt, he runs a hand through Derek's hair. Derek shifts uneasily; grunts when the movement hurts. Stiles's hand stops moving. "Is touching your hair good or bad?" Stiles asks. 

"It's fine," Derek growls. 

"'Fine' is not a color." Stiles moves his hands away from Derek’s hair, resting them on Derek's sides now, between his hip bones and rib cage; soft on skin that doesn't hurt. 

Derek blames blood loss for why everything is so confusing. Maybe he's hallucinating. "Touching is green," he says, because if he's dreaming, then there's no harm in telling Stiles that he needs something. “You just--I wasn’t expecting it.” 

He lets himself drift, vaguely concerned about the taste of blood in his mouth; interested but distant from the sensation of Stiles cutting the jeans from around Derek's right thigh. Stiles keeps as much physical contact as possible, maybe because Derek had said it would help. Derek curiously observes that while Stiles's fingers hesitantly move around Derek's wounds, Stiles leans against Derek's left leg while examining his right. 

"I think we should get you in the tub before we clean these wounds out," Stiles says, one hand coming to Derek's face and tilting it until they're making eye contact. "That way your bathroom will look less like a crime scene when you have to clean it up." 

"I had a towel," Derek says in his own defense, before he starts to stand up and pain shoots through his body again. The act of straightening up feels like his stomach is being retorn, the edges of the wounds that had started to heal protesting the motion. 

"I'm sure it was a very nice towel," Stiles is saying, trying to manhandle Derek into the bathtub without touching any bruised parts of his body. "I bet it was _Hitchiker's Guide_ quality. Now, can you lift your left leg for me?" 

Derek can, but he has to lean almost his entire weight on Stiles while he does. Moving his right leg is easier, since he can support his own weight on his left leg; it just hurts more. "Sorry," he gasps, grabbing onto a handhold in the shower to keep himself upright.

"Sorry? Sorry for what? What went wrong? Are you okay? Color. Give me a color." 

"Beige," Derek says, leaning his forehead against the cool tile of the wall. It feels nice. He's smiling for some reason. Everything hurts and Stiles makes no sense. "Or maybe green. I don't know. Sorry."

"It's okay," Stiles says, running his hands through Derek’s hair.

Stiles waits for the water to warm up, and apologizes while he cleans every wound on Derek's body. Derek just watches him, since he's pretty sure he'll fall down if he attempts to help. He tries to figure out why Stiles is in his bathroom, getting Derek's blood under his fingernails, getting his own clothes wet and dirty, all the while keeping up a stream of conversation that Derek feels no pressure to participate in. 

He can feel it when the water and Stiles's gentle touch with a washcloth clear the poison out of a wound, and he tells Stiles when to move to the next gash. Four in his thigh, four in his stomach. By the time Stiles is done, Derek's swaying on his feet, and all he wants to do is kiss Stiles. 

"Poison's all gone," he says. 

Stiles drops the washcloth and says, "Fucking finally," heaving a big breath. 

Derek blinks at him, at the tired, curved line of his back, and says, “Borrow dry clothes before you go.” 

Stiles stands up, and his face contorts for a bit before he says, "No. Now, I'm going to help you out of the shower, and dry you off, and--and make bandages out of some of your old sheets. And then I'm going to put you to bed and have no sex with you at all. Because I'm your--your--"

"Boyfriend," Derek supplies, because that's what he's been calling Stiles in his head. 

"Yeah," Stiles says, after an uncomfortably long pause. "Because I'm your boyfriend, and not an evil druid, who expects you to put out when you're half-dead." 

Derek lets Stiles manhandle him out of the bathtub. It's already easier to move; his stomach feels less like it’s about to split open. "Jennifer wasn't that bad," Derek says, not sure if he's defending Jennifer or himself. "It was really nice to just..." To just have someone touch him. He doesn't finish the sentence, because it sounds pathetic when he thinks about it longer. He’s not going to tell Stiles how long it had been since someone touched him the way that Jennifer had. (Not since Laura had anyone been gentle, or careful, or kind with him.)

"Okay," Stiles says, kissing a spot on Derek's collarbone that Stiles seems to really like. Stiles has random favorite spots on Derek's body. Derek likes that. He'll tell Stiles that sometime, sometime when he can kiss Stiles and point out his favorite spots on Stiles's body, too. 

Stiles gets him dried off, apologizing every time he accidentally touches an injury, apologizing as he cuts a set of Derek's sheets into long strips, apologizing as he wraps the strips around Derek's thigh as tight as he can to stop the bleeding that's already slowing down. 

"I'm green," Derek says, watching Stiles's long, graceful hands tighten a knot in the fabric. “If that helps.” 

"Oh," Stiles says. He looks up at Derek, who feels suddenly much less floaty and much more exposed when faced with Stiles's direct focus. "Good." 

Wrapping his stomach hurts a lot more than his thigh had. Derek fangs out during it. He apologizes until Stiles huffs and says that _he's_ green with it, so Derek should get over himself and just be careful with the claws while he finishes up. 

Stiles helps Derek to bed, sitting him down on the edge of it before walking away. Derek's genuinely surprised when Stiles comes back, because he'd seemed _really_ anti-sex earlier. Then Stiles presses an open bottle of water into one of Derek's hands and a granola bar into the other. 

After that, Derek keeps a careful eye on Stiles. He says, "Yellow," when Stiles goes back into the bathroom to try and start cleaning up. Says, "Yellow," when Stiles picks up Derek's bloody jacket and brings it to the kitchen sink to wash out. Says, "Yellow?" when Stiles goes to the coat rack, puts his jacket on, then locks the door from the inside and heads back to bed. 

"What's yellow?" Stiles asks. 

"You're not leaving," Derek says. 

Stiles stands in front of him, then sticks his hands in his pockets. "I got my jacket because I'm cold. And I suspect that you would have said 'green' if I'd asked if I should leave," Stiles says. Since he's right, Derek stays quiet. "And I think that the truth would be 'red.'" 

Derek wraps an arm around his stomach. He doesn’t like this. He doesn’t like being exposed like this. "Red," Derek whispers.

"Okay," Stiles says, taking his hands out of his pockets. "No more questions. No more serious conversation, I promise." He steps closer and runs his hands through Derek's hair, not moving away when Derek leans forward and rests his head on Stiles's stomach. "Just--can I get you to lie down? I think it'll be a lot more comfortable." 

When they get Derek on his back, right leg elevated, he does feel better. Stiles finishes plumping all of the pillows to his satisfaction, then plasters himself along Derek's left side. "Phyical contact helps, right?" Stiles asks. "Speeds up healing?" 

"Yeah," Derek says. He'd given his power to Cora this way, touching her, giving her strength. 

"I'd stay even if it wasn't, like, magical morphine. I'd stay with you anyway." Stiles kisses that random place on Derek's collarbone again. "Being with you makes me feel good. I like that you're my boyfriend." 

Since Derek hadn't actually planned on using that word, and had only let it slip due to massive blood loss, he grunts a little. "I'm not a boy," he says. 

"I know. You a big burly manly man. But you're still my boyfriend. You're stuck with me." 

Stiles's arms and legs and head are heavy on Derek's left side, sprawled on top of him, but carefully placed so that he's nowhere close to the places on Derek's body that are still healing. 

Derek doesn't have a color for what it means that Stiles falls safe enough to fall asleep like that, warm and calm and wrapped around Derek.

**Author's Note:**

> I have a [tumblr](http://hoosierbitch.tumblr.com) now.


End file.
